The application prospect of smart ink is very impressive, however, there are still many technical obstacles in the application of smart ink. Some obstacles are not the problem of the ink itself but the problem of printing. The more intelligent the ink, the more difficult it is to print with them. For example, printing with heat-sensitive inks used in a low-temperature environment is very difficult because it must be printed in a room temperature environment. Another issue is the cost issue. In the past decade, the average selling price of an RFID tag has dropped from 100 US dollars to 1 US dollar, and is expected to drop to a lower level, when it will be more competitive than electronic chips. Due to the widespread use of the tracing and tracking system from large bulk shipments to individual products, sales of RFID, smart inks, or sheets will rapidly increase. Retailers in the United States have experimented with using RFID systems instead of bar code identification systems to improve the efficiency of inventory audits and speed customers through the checkout desk. It is believed that major businesses will be more willing to use the RFID system.
The most important issue at present is to properly lower the cost of RFID tags. Some companies in foreign countries are experimenting to limit the cost of each RFID tag to within one US dollar, but they hope to reduce it to three cents. Product labeling has become a necessary choice for products entering the international market. If a 96-bit smart tag with an integrated circuit and an antenna is embedded in each product, the data can be transmitted to the Internet via a radio wave reader. Save hundreds of millions of dollars directly. At the same time, the benefits to the customer are also considerable. Some foreign research institutions dedicated to smart technologies believe that through the improvement of integrated circuits, antennas, and manufacturing processes, the cost of RFID and other electronic tags will soon drop to the price that merchants can generally accept. The biggest cost reduction will be in the manufacture of integrated circuits. The cost of assembly of integrated circuits, antennas, and other components, as well as the cost of applying them to product packaging, will be appropriately reduced.
From a long-term perspective, printing will play an important role in cutting costs, especially in the final stages of manufacturing. The RFID antenna has been embedded on the label by traditional printing methods, and inks containing more components required by RFID and other electronic devices will soon be developed. The new inks will not consist of pigments, binders, solvents and additives, but will be tubular, spherical and other shapes of nanoscale particles, conductive and luminescent polymers, and as solvents and additives. Molecular composition. Also, this new type of ink can be printed using existing printing processes. For certain applications, each process has its advantages. Perhaps different processes will be used at different stages for the entire manufacturing process. Inevitably, there are many technical obstacles that we need to solve. These include the need to enhance the performance of semiconductor polymers, as well as substantial improvements in printing resolution, register accuracy, necessary barrier layers, and a clean printing environment. Once these obstacles are eliminated, traditional printing will hopefully become a global manufacturing method for electronic components.