Intelligent Packaging Monitors Medicine, Perishable Goods

Flickr CC/e-Magine Art

July 11, 2012 By News Staff

Packaging is getting smarter. Norwegian printed electronics developer Thinfilm announced a partnership on July 10 with American packaging giant Bemis. Thinfilm makes inexpensive, printed electronics, including integrated time and temperature sensors, for monitoring perishable goods and medicines. In this vein, Thinfilm will develop for Bemis an extended, customizable packaging platform called the Bemis Intelligent Packaging Platform.

“Intelligent packaging is an emerging technology with many potential intersections with Bemis’ flexible packaging and pressure sensitive materials business segments,” Bemis President and CEO Henry Theisen said in a press release. “Our agreement with Thinfilm represents an investment in a technology that could eventually make printed electronics a component of every package we manufacture.”

Thinfilm will be combining printed wireless transmitters with existing printed logic, memory, sensor and battery systems on product packaging, reported MIT’s Technology Review. “This is a step toward an Internet of things, where you have the embodiment of a printed system that can go on any object,” Davor Sutija, CEO of Thinfilm, told the publication.

Bemis’ packaging is used for a wide range of products from meat and cheese to medical devices and personal care items.

The platform is expected to be commercially available in 2014.

You may use or reference this story with attribution and a link to
http://www.govtech.com/technology/Intelligent-Packaging-Medicine-Perishable-Goods.html

| More

Comments