The chip maker said the new Intel R1000 transceiver consolidates about 90 percent of the components in a typical RFID reader onto a single small chip.

The R1000 is 8mm by 8mm in size and can be implemented for a wide variety of applications, said Kerry Krause, Intel's director of marketing for RFID. He noted that the chip can be implanted on loading-dock doors, handheld devices, conveyer belts, forklifts and printers.

"It's quite versatile," said Krause. "It's highly integrated and flexible."

He said customers are designing it into a full range of RFID readers -- from handheld devices that require close proximity to the tags as well as in high-performance devices that can do reads over longer distances.

Krause noted that most RFID readers are large and complex, and require hundreds of separate components to send and receive radio signals to and from RFID tags.