RFID technology seems to be on the rise lately. After Mitsubishi announced a super-efficient tag reader last month and NEC said it was able to dramatically cut production costs for RFID two weeks ago, it’s now Hitachi’s turn: The company has announced today that it has developed the world’s smallest RFID chip.

Hitachi claims their chip measures only 0.075×0.075mm, 80% smaller than the company’s smallest RFID chip available now. The new chip is made by observing how human cells are worked with in medicine. In the production process, the new chips are first floated in a liquid solution, picked up individually using a pipette and then transferred on to a substrate.

Hitachi says the new chips are cheaper to produce than the current models of the company, which cost slightly more than 10 cents per unit.

Via Nikkei [registration required, paid subscription]