Coca-Cola has begun testing a new soft drinks dispenser which uses passive RFID technology. The new system will allow a machine to offer over 100 choices of beverage while taking up no more space than the current 8-valve dispenser.

Cartridges containing concentrated flavouring will dispense a small amount of the appropriate flavour, which will then be mixed with the other ingredients, such as sweetener, water, and carbonating agent, and dispensed to the customer. Maintaining a wide variety of cartridges in a single dispenser is problematic, which is where RFID comes in.

When the cartridge is produced, it is fitted with an RFID passive tag, which will contain details of the flavour it contains and the quantity. RFID readers in the dispensers can then register the cartridge as it is inserted, and ensure it is placed in the correct slot, which will be identified to the user by a LED.

Once the cartridge has been correctly installed, the data on the cartridge’s passive RFID tag can be updated each time a drink is dispensed, to keep track of the quantity of flavouring remaining. This information can also be relayed back to Coca-Cola’s management system, and used to automatically detect when a cartridge is nearing depletion, allowing a replacement to be prepared. This also allows the company up-to-date information on consumption patterns, and finally the direct link to the dispenser allows a particular cartridge to be instantly disabled for any reason, be it a recall or withdrawal of a product line.

Four years in development, the Freestyle dispenser is currently being tested in selected restaurants in Atlanta and southern California before a planned wider roll-out next year.