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Powercast’s Battery-Free RFID Sensor Condition Monitoring System Wins Best New Product at RFID Journal LIVE

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Powercast’s RFID-powered, wire-and-battery-free sensor monitoring system customized for data center equipment monitoring takes home top honors

PITTSBURGH, May 9, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — Powercast Corporation, the go-to source for the entire spectrum of wireless charging solutions, announced that RFID Journal LIVE! has honored Powercast’s RFID-powered, wire-and-battery-free sensor condition monitoring system customized for data centers as its Best New Product 2025.

The judges, led by founder and former RFIDJournal.com editor Mark Roberti, evaluated the six Best New Product finalists onsite at the RFID Journal LIVE! conference held May 6 – 8 in Las Vegas, NV, with the winner announced on May 8. As winner, Powercast will present a one-hour webinar later in 2025, and will also do a 40-minute conference session during the 2026 edition of RFID Journal LIVE!

“Considering the outstanding technology exhibited by the finalists, we are honored the judges chose our RFID-powered, wire-and-battery-free sensor monitoring system for data centers as the Best New Product 2025,” said Charles Greene, Ph.D., COO and CTO of Powercast.

Roberti noted that all of the finalists had innovative products, but the judges were unanimous in selecting Powercast’s energy harvesting, passive light, temperature and humidity sensor as it will open up new applications in health care, pharma, and the food supply chain, as well as managing data center assets.

“Instead of an expensive active tag with a battery that needs to be replaced every few years, companies can now use Powercast’s low-cost passive sensor, which requires no maintenance,” Roberti said. “And unlike other passive sensors, the Powercast product can write sensor data to the tag’s memory, so companies can learn if a product was outside of temperature requirements at some point. We think this passive sensor will have many applications across several different industries.”

Powercast collaborated with Asset Vue to customize its RFID sensing technology – known for maintenance-free monitoring because it can power itself perpetually from RAIN RFID inventory readers instead of wires and batteries – to monitor the temperature and humidity of mission-critical equipment stored on metal server racks without adding to the complexity of a data center.

Customizations included halving the size of Powercast’s existing RFID sensors to fit into server racks, and redesigning the RF receiving antenna to avoid interference from the metal racks while still providing long range wireless power to the sensors. The system is currently in beta testing at Asset Vue’s data center, and Powercast plans to roll it out later this year.

RAIN RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology leverages the RFID readers used in inventory management, logistics and retail applications to connect to the internet any item bearing an RFID tag, allowing users to identify and locate all such items. Adding Powercast’s wireless RF-energy-harvesting chips and sensors (temperature, humidity, light, etc.) to these RFID tags elevates their functionality beyond identification to enable real-time smart monitoring that results in smarter supply chains capable of locating live shipments, tracking the state of perishable goods and more, all without wires and batteries.

How Powercast’s RFID Condition Monitoring Technology Works, Leveraging RFID Readers as its Power Source:

Since standard RAIN RFID readers emit an RF signal that’s similar to that of Powercast’s RF wireless power transmitters, these readers can substitute for the transmitters, becoming the source of wireless power that perpetually powers the sensor tags without wires or batteries, eliminating the need/expense for hardwiring sensors, ongoing battery maintenance, or installing custom readers or RF transmitters.

Powercast’s Powerharvester® PCC110 receiver chip embedded in the RFID sensor tags harvests RF and data sent over the air from any RFID reader within range, which can be up to 40 meters depending on the application. A single RFID reader can power many tags at once located over a large area as long as they’re within range. Readers can be fixed infrastructure installed in the ceiling, or handheld readers used by employees.

The Powerharvester chip then converts the RF to usable DC to both power the tags and communicate data. A microcontroller and sensors receive power, measure conditions, and report that data back to the reader.

Peel-back adhesive on the backs of the RFID sensor tags make them easy to install anywhere.

About Powercast
Powercast Corporation, founded in 2003 and based in Pittsburgh, PA, is the go-to resource for wireless charging solutions, ranging from short to long distances and from microwatts to kilowatts, with the industry’s broadest technology portfolio backed by over 300 patents worldwide. We design, develop, and manufacture semiconductor chips as well as complete wirelessly powered products, enabling various levels of customer integration.
Powercast’s solutions include RF power-over-distance charging, high-performance inductive charging systems, and low-power sensors with up to 25-year battery life. With flexible magnetic resonance systems, Powercast positions itself as the industry’s most comprehensive source for wireless power technology. For more information, visit https://www.powercastco.com.

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SOURCE Powercast

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Tencent Cloud PalmAI Unveils Palm X, Bringing Palm Verification to Standard RGB Cameras

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SHENZHEN, China, Sept. 24, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Tencent Cloud, the cloud business of global technology company Tencent, has unveiled Palm X, a new palmprint verification solution. As an extension of its PalmAI technology, Palm X is specifically designed to be compatible with standard RGB cameras. By extending palm verification to widely available camera-equipped devices such as smartphones, Palm X enables enterprises to integrate palm-based identity verification into mobile applications and digital services without requiring dedicated palm-scanning hardware.

Palm verification has traditionally been associated with fixed offline terminals equipped with specialized biometric devices; however, Palm X expands its potential applications by providing businesses with a more flexible way to introduce palm verification into digital user journeys by offering a software-based alternative.

Extending Palm Verification Beyond Dedicated Hardware

Palm X uses standard RGB cameras to capture and verify palmprints without requiring dedicated infrared or palm-vein scanning hardware. Users can enroll and verify their palmprints through supported camera-equipped devices, making the technology easier to integrate into existing mobile applications and online services.

The solution supports 1:1 identity verification and one-to-many palmprint matching within defined enrolled user groups. With 1:1 verification, a live palmprint is matched against the palmprint associated with a specified user identity. One-to-many matching searches within an enrolled group to help identify a user or detect duplicate enrollments.

Palm X also incorporates liveness detection mechanisms designed to help mitigate presentation attacks, such as those involving photos and screen replays. This allows enterprises to use palm verification in scenarios requiring both identity confirmation and protection against common spoofing attempts.

For enterprise deployment, Palm X can be seamlessly integrated into existing authentication and risk-control systems through mobile SDKs and backend APIs. Rather than replacing an organization’s current identity infrastructure, it can serve as a complementary authentication factor alongside passwords, SMS verification codes, facial verification, passkeys, and other methods.

Businesses can introduce palm verification at different stages of the user journey according to their security requirements, user experience goals, and risk levels. The use of standard cameras also minimizes reliance on dedicated terminals, allowing palm verification to extend from fixed offline environments to mobile applications and digital workflows.

Supporting a Wider Range of Identity Scenarios

Palm X supports a wider range of identity scenarios by addressing the growing enterprise need for verification methods that balance user experience, privacy, and ease of deployment.

In financial services, Palm X can complement existing authentication processes in scenarios such as account login and identity confirmation. Enterprises can integrate it alongside existing authentication methods based on their business and security requirements.

For Web3 communities and digital platforms, Palm X can support user verification and help detect duplicate enrollments. It can be applied to scenarios such as trusted account registration, community access, and campaign participation.

Palm X can also support membership programs and online-to-offline (O2O) service scenarios. Once enrolled, users can verify their identity for check-ins, membership recognition, benefit redemption, or service access without relying solely on physical cards or other credentials.

Unlike biometric features that may appear in publicly shared photos or videos, palmprints typically require users to deliberately present their palms for capture. This ensures palm verification remains a highly intentional interaction while reducing biometric exposure in public imagery.

Making palm verification easier to integrate across industries

“Facial recognition is widely adopted for identity verification today, while businesses and users are also looking for more diverse approaches to biometric verification. With Palm X, we are introducing a palmprint-based option that is compatible with standard RGB cameras, making palm verification easier to integrate into existing digital services while giving users a more intentional way to verify their identity,” said Sine, Director of Palm X Product at Tencent Cloud.

Palm X marks Tencent Cloud PalmAI’s latest step in expanding palm verification beyond dedicated biometric hardware. By combining palmprint verification, liveness detection, mobile SDKs, and backend APIs, the solution offers enterprises a flexible option for introducing palm-based verification into their existing services.

Looking ahead, Tencent Cloud PalmAI will continue collaborating with customers and ecosystem partners worldwide to explore how palm verification can be applied for secure identity verification, digital platforms, membership services, and other business environments.

Learn more about Palm X: Palm X — Palm Recognition & Palm Verification SDK for Smartphone Cameras

About Tencent Cloud

Tencent Cloud, one of the world’s leading cloud companies, is committed to creating innovative solutions to resolve real-world issues and enabling digital transformation for smart industries. Through our extensive global infrastructure, Tencent Cloud provides businesses across the globe with stable and secure industry-leading cloud products and services, leveraging technological advancements such as cloud computing, Big Data analytics, AI, IoT, and cybersecurity. It is our constant mission to meet the needs of industries across the board, including the fields of gaming, media and entertainment, finance, healthcare, real estate, retail, travel, and transportation. 

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SOURCE Tencent Cloud

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Plainly Launches Plainly Flows, a Workflow Automation Platform for Creative Teams

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The new product lets creative teams turn their repetitive creative work into automated workflows that any team can operate.

LONDON, Sept. 24, 2026 /CNW/ — Plainly, the company behind video automation platform Plainly Videos, today launched Plainly Flows, a workflow automation platform that lets creative teams set up their production workflow once and put asset creation directly into the hands of teams requesting them.

Marketing teams, local branches, and agency clients regularly need creative assets. Getting them means submitting a request, waiting for a designer, and repeating the same production process that ran last time. Creative teams spend a significant portion of their time executing repeatable work rather than building new things. Plainly Flows automates that repeatable work and puts it directly in the hands of the people requesting it.

Creative teams build workflows by setting up video templates, adding AI generation steps, and defining which elements change through inputs. End users fill out inputs through a simple interface, and Plainly Flows generates high-quality, on-brand assets based on the workflow.

During the beta, a B2B company used Plainly Flows to send personalized CEO avatar videos to customers every quarter, pulling in usage data and milestones automatically. Their customer success team now produces 50 to 70 personalized renewal videos per month in 2 to 3 minutes each. A different customer uses the platform to generate event graphics on-site through a phone, outputting finished video in three aspect ratios through a single workflow.

“Most automation tools were built around business data, not creative files,” said Nebojša Savičić, CEO of Plainly. “Plainly Flows lets creative teams encode their production knowledge into a workflow anyone in the organization can run.”

Plainly Flows is available now at https://plainlyflows.com/.

About Plainly

Plainly is a London-based automation company for creative production. Its first product, Plainly Videos, is a cloud-based video automation platform built on native Adobe After Effects rendering and an official Adobe Video Technology Partner, used by organizations including WPP Production and UNICEF Australia. Plainly Flows is its second product. Learn more at plainlyvideos.com

 

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SOURCE Plainly

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AI Moves from Optional to Essential: Canton Fair Service Robots to Showcase Real-World Problem Solving

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GUANGZHOU, China, Sept. 24, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The 140th Canton Fair will open on October 15, bringing together a new generation of AI-powered robotics solutions. As AI becomes a standard feature across industries, competition is shifting from whether products use AI to how effectively they use it to solve real-world challenges.

AI Brings Intelligent Companionship to Home and Eldercare

In home and elderly care settings, AI transforms robots from single-function executors into intelligent companions, capable of emotional interaction and health monitoring for users of all ages.

Through AI-powered emotion recognition and conversation capabilities, the companion robot helps reduce loneliness and emotional stress while maintaining a simple, intuitive user experience.

An Eldercare Robot integrates health monitoring, medication reminders, video consultations, fall detection, emergency alerts, remote caregiving and daily companionship functions into a single platform designed specifically for older users.

AI Improves Efficiency in Food Service and Cleaning Operations

In catering and cleaning, AI drives autonomous decision-making and multi-robot coordination to lower operating costs and enhance service consistency.

For instance, embodied robot platforms designed for food-service environments can combine compliant service functions with lightweight collaborative arms, enabling robots to perform a wider range of tasks safely and efficiently.

For public-space maintenance, the smart cleaning robot combines autonomous driving and AI-powered waste recognition with fully unmanned cleaning, docking, charging and replenishment capabilities for round-the-clock operation.

AI Enhances Emergency Response in High-Risk Environments

In emergency response, AI enables robots to operate in conditions that challenge human safety and endurance.

For example, explosion-proof fire reconnaissance robots can operate in hazardous environments involving fire, smoke, toxic gases and explosive materials. Combining AI-powered reconnaissance with a high-flow firefighting cannon, it supports precise fire detection and suppression while minimizing danger to rescue personnel.

From consumer-focused emotional companionship to industrial-grade operations, AI is transforming robots from conventional automated machines into intelligent systems with greater autonomy and interactive capabilities. As technology continues to reshape human-machine collaboration, visitors to the 140th Canton Fair are invited to discover how AI is delivering tangible value by solving real-world challenges across industries and everyday life.

For pre-registration, please click:
https://buyer.cantonfair.org.cn/register/buyer/email?source_type=16

 

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SOURCE Canton Fair

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