Design Verification and Measurement Techniques for UHF RFID Tag IC

Ultra High Frequency (UHF) Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology is growing rapidly in recent years. Passive tag is one of the most important components that construct the UHF RFID system. This paper presents the design verification and measurement techniques for UHF RFID tag IC, which can meet the designers´ demands for verification and test purposes at low cost. A baseband verification platform based on Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) is introduced at first. The proposed instrument can be used to test the function of the tag´s baseband processor at early phase. It can also help designers with Hardware Description Language (HDL) code debugging and, therefore, improves the reliability of the design before tape-out. For the purpose of RF measurements, a novel approach based on commercial reader, tunable attenuator, and directional couplers is presented. This method precludes the need for high-end RFID tester when measuring the sensitivity and impedance of a tag chip. The measured results are critical for tag antenna design. Applying the techniques mentioned above, our fabricated tag chips are tested. And a dipole antenna is designed for tag assembly.