'Smart Packaging' for David S Smith.

Flying Null, inventors of revolutionary magnetic tagging technology, and David S Smith have announced an agreement under which David S Smith will incorporate Flying Null's unique product tracking and identification technology into their range of packaging products. Initially this solution will be offered to David S Smith's offline customers, however, the intention is to quickly provide the company's e-business customers with a viable answer to the problems of tracking and guaranteeing the e-fulfilment process.

Flying Null's invention, the FN Tag, is a tiny magnetic tag only a few centimetres long which can store a wealth of information that can be read at distance using a simple handheld scanner. Due to its magnetic nature these tags can be read without line-of-sight so can be 'buried' or hidden in goods and packaging.

The agreement with David S Smith means that for the first time individual products and packages can be assigned a unique and unalterable identification code at very little cost. Although RFID chips have offered this capability for some time their cost has been prohibitive. Retailers, warehousers, and shippers can use these FN tags to uniquely identify individual packages and link them to specific orders giving details such as stock number, pallet location, date ordered, destination, etc.