Shipment data from top manufacturers reflects proliferating use cases and growing demand for RAIN technology across countless industries
26 February 2025 – RAIN Alliance, the non-profit industry organization supporting the development and adoption of standards-based Ultra High Frequency (UHF) Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), has today announced that 52.8bn RAIN tag chips / ICs were shipped globally in 2024, as reported by five of its leading tag manufacturer members – EM Microelectronic, Impinj, NXP, Shanghai Fudan Microelectronics Group and Shanghai Quanray Electronics.
RAIN technology connects billions of everyday items to the internet, enabling businesses to use RAIN readers to identify, locate, authenticate, and engage with products with an attached RAIN tag. The 2024 shipments figure reflects continued year-on-year market growth, with the scale of demand notably marked by a 54% increase in RAIN tag chip shipments in just two years.
“We’re continuing to see strong appetite for RAIN technology across various industries, as reflected by the 52.8bn tag chips shipped in the last 12 months. This is driven by an increase in mandates for a wider range of items to be tagged with RAIN technology – including beauty products, sports equipment and electronics – as well as continued growth in penetration in other industries such as pharmaceuticals, healthcare, logistics and manufacturing,” said Aileen Ryan, President and CEO of RAIN Alliance. “Emerging use cases will continue to drive future growth, for instance, as businesses increasingly harness and expand their deployments in recognition of the wider sustainability benefits that RAIN can offer. Notable among these is RAIN’s capacity to act as a data carrier that enables compliance with the European Union’s incoming Digital Product Passport regulations.”
The RAIN Alliance was recently accepted as a liaison to the CEN/CENELEC JTC24 Committee and will support in the creation of standards for the Digital Product Passport Framework. Acknowledging the role that RAIN technology can play in both enterprise and consumer contexts – especially within sustainability use cases – Qualcomm has confirmed its active involvement in the ecosystem that is integrating RAIN reader technology into enterprise and consumer mobile handsets.
“With the rollout of RAIN-enabled enterprise mobile devices expected within a few quarters and consumer devices set to follow, we expect the RAIN technology market to continue its upwards trajectory in the coming years,” continued Ryan. “The RAIN Alliance is working to support and accelerate the integration of RAIN technology into mobile devices. We are committed to making RAIN-enabled mobile devices a reality, and enabling new enterprise, consumer and sustainability use cases that will change how we interact with items on a daily basis.”
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Notes for editors:
All data collected for this project is proprietary and presented in aggregate, not individual company shipment numbers. The objective of collecting, analyzing, and promoting this data is to provide the marketplace and RAIN Alliance members with a key indicator of market performance and adoption.