sticker tags

Neology, the San Diego based supplier of ISO18000 6C sticker tag systems for tolling and vehicle registration has been taken over by Holland-based SMARTRAC in $30m deal that leaves 15% of the shares with its majority owner Tenedora SA of Mexico.

Federal Signal and its Sirit unit have been sued in US District Court by Neology over six alleged breaches of Neology 6C patents. The lawsuit was filed today in the US court in Delaware where both companies are registered.

The lawsuit demands that Federal Signal and related companies such as its subsidiary Sirit cease manufacturing, marketing and selling the ISO 18000 6C protocol RFID tags, readers and systems.

At Oklahoma Turnpike Authority (OTA) they are aiming to replace about a million hardbodied vintage 2001 Allegro transponders with TransCore eGo Plus ISO 18000 6B-variant sticker tags by end-2012 in an upgrade of their PIKEPASS brand electronic tolling.  They'll need perhaps 1.2m of the new tags for the switchover.

By early August Oklahoma's turnpikes should all be fully equipped with TransCore's dual mode E6 readers (Encompass 6) to allow a start on a two to three year transition away from the existing hardcase/battery-equipped Allegro transponders to eGo Plus sticker tags. The reader infrastructure will consist of E6 readers installed in 377 toll lanes (plus 23 spares purchased) on ten turnpikes - 400 readers for $6m, they tell us.

Federal Signal/Sirit ISO 18000 6C standard sticker tags and ID5100 readers will be used for the government of Thailand's electronic vehicle registration project. Starting later this year motorists registering their vehicle in Thailand will have the option of receiving an RFID sticker tag in place of the normal printed tag.

Mexican toll and motor vehicle registry authorities are cooperating to deploy sticker tags on the windshield of every vehicle in the country.

A joint venture of 3M and Sirit is quietly mounting a major challenge to TransCore's supremacy in sticker tags for tolling and other motor vehicle identification.

Sticker tags are quietly gaining significant US market share, the latest state toll system to commit to go with stickers being the Kansas Turnpike. The Oklahoma Turnpike is testing them. Kansas is closer to a adopting them and it will be the first fully trip-based or 'ticket' toll system to use sticker tags.

July 1 they started selling sticker tags in Florida and collecting tolls with the tiny paper thin wonders - the IBM-developed eGo product supplied by TransCore and being marketed by Florida tollers as SunPass Mini. As of last Thursday we're told 15,500 have been sold, which by our calculation works out to 12,000/week. That matches almost exactly Florida Turnpike Enterprise' target of selling 600k in the first year (though any extrapolation from ten days data is a stretch.)

This road trip report from a Washington DC blogger named KC states the case for non-portable transponders with special eloquence:

"The EZ-Pass is in the other car

Time of insult: approximately 40 minutes into trip