Impinj and Alien Technology Announce Supply Agreement for RFID Chips

-- Impinj, Inc., the fabless semiconductor company whose patented Self-Adaptive Silicon® technology enables its high performance radio-frequency identification (RFID) products and Alien Technology Corporation, a market leader in UHF RFID tags, today announced a long-term agreement under which Impinj will provide its Monza™ Generation 2 (Gen 2) chips for inclusion in Alien®’s RFID inlay and strap products.

Monza, part of Impinj’s GrandPrix™ solution for robust RFID systems, is the world’s first tag chip designed according to the Gen 2 standard promulgated by EPCglobal Inc., the industry consortium established to promote RFID in the global supply chain.

Alien Technology uses its patented manufacturing process, Fluidic Self Assembly (FSA®), to fabricate RFID inlays and straps in unprecedented volumes at very low cost.  Utilizing Impinj’s Monza chips, Alien will produce high performance inlays and straps targeting global customers in government, retail, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, transportation and other industries.

“Alien has established itself as a market leader in RFID for EPC applications, and is especially effective in using their FSA technology to address the tag assembly challenge faced by the RFID industry,” said Dr. William Colleran, president and CEO, Impinj.  “Under this arrangement, both Alien and Impinj leverage our complementary strengths – Impinj’s chip design prowess and Alien’s assembly capability – to deliver very high performance RFID products at competitive cost.  We are delighted to announce our relationship which we expect will provide differentiated products that meet current and future market needs.”

 “Our collaboration with Impinj on Gen 2 products is a natural extension of our combined efforts in the EPC standards development process,” remarked Dr. Steve Smith, CTO and Founder, Alien Technology Corporation.  “We are impressed by the time-to-market and performance of Impinj’s Monza silicon, and we look forward to offering the first high volume, low cost production availability of Gen 2 tags and inlays in the industry to our meet customers’ needs.”

Impinj’s Monza chips provide the benefits enabled by the Gen 2 protocol.  In addition, Monza features excellent range, robustness and the option for tags that are less orientation sensitive when used in a dual antenna configuration.  Monza was designed to ensure excellent RF impedance and ESD insensitivity, which in turn enable high speed inlay and strap manufacturing.  Alien expects to sample Monza-based inlays and straps in September with volume shipments commencing in 4Q 2005.

About Impinj, Inc.

Impinj, Inc. is a fabless semiconductor company whose patented Self-Adaptive Silicon® technology enables its two synergistic business lines: high performance RFID products and cost-effective semiconductor intellectual property (SIP).  A leading contributor to the RFID standards for high volume supply-chain applications worldwide, Impinj leverages its technical expertise and industry partnerships to deliver the GrandPrix™ solution, comprising tags, readers, software and systems integration to offer RFID that just works™.  Impinj’s innovative SIP products, core to the company’s RFID tags, are licensed to leading semiconductor companies worldwide, allowing them to cost-effectively integrate crucial nonvolatile memory (NVM) alongside analog and digital functionality on a single chip.  Impinj's SIP products include the popular AEON™ memory, the world's first rewriteable NVM technology compatible with logic CMOS manufacturing, and AEFuse™, the world's first rewriteable fuse architecture.  For more information, visit www.impinj.com.

About Alien Technology

Alien Technology Corporation is a leading provider of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) products for global customers in government, retail, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, transportation, and other industries. Using its patented manufacturing process, Fluidic Self Assembly (FSA), Alien manufactures EPC tags in very high-volumes and at low cost. The company provides a family of RFID readers for a variety of applications including supply chain management, logistics, and anti-counterfeiting, to improve inventory management and reduce operating costs. Alien is an active member of EPCglobal. More information about Alien Technology Corporation can be found on the Company's website at www.alientechnology.com.

Impinj, Self-Adaptive Silicon, GrandPrix and Monza are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Impinj, Inc.

Alien, Alien Technology, the Alien logo, and FSA are trademarks or registered trademarks of Alien Technology Corporation in the United States and other countries.