Patent Description:
<FIG> shows a checkout system <NUM>, which has been proposed in recent years for a smooth checkout at stores. This checkout system <NUM> is made up of: a RF tag <NUM> attached to each product P; a reader/writer <NUM> that reads information from the RF tag <NUM>; and a register <NUM> that is communicatively connected to the reader/writer <NUM>. The reader/writer <NUM> is installed on the back face of the checkout counter T. The reader/writer <NUM> reads information collectively from the RF tags <NUM> of the products P in the shopping basket on the checkout counter T, and transmits the read information to the register <NUM>. The register <NUM> then performs checkout processing based on the product information (product names and prices) corresponding to the received information.

This checkout system <NUM> enables a checkout with a simple operation of placing a shopping basket on the checkout counter T. The system enables a checkout for the shopping basket that is placed on the checkout counter T, and this allows customers to visually check the contents in the basket and reconfirm the products P to be purchased even during the checkout process. This system has the communication area of the reader/writer <NUM> that is continuous to the space where the customer exists, and this configuration therefore causes the radio waves emitted from the antenna of the reader/writer <NUM> to affect other devices or the radio waves emitted from other devices to interfere with the communication radio waves of the reader/writer <NUM>.

To avoid this, the reader of Patent Literature <NUM> includes a housing for accommodating products put through an opening and a lid for opening and closing the opening, and the housing and the lid are formed of a material that reflects or absorbs radio waves. This reader prevents the above-mentioned problems about radio waves, because it reads RF tags when the opening of the housing is closed with the lid, i.e., when the articles stored in the housing are sealed with the shield.

Patent application <CIT>, discloses a wireless tag reader/writer antenna, which according to its summary includes an antenna unit that incorporates a reader/writer antenna for transmitting and receiving electromagnetic waves to and from wireless tags; and a plurality of magnetic-wave shields that clamp the antenna unit and extend in a direction of radiating electromagnetic waves from the reader/writer antenna.

Additionally, patent application <CIT> discloses, according to its summary, an array antenna for a radio frequency identification (RFID) system, the array antenna comprises a transmission line with a longitudinal span proximately equaling to a height of a space desired to be covered by the array antenna, the transmission line having a terminal coupled to a RFID reader, and a plurality of radiating elements disposed on the first transmission line along the longitudinal span, additionally, reflective materials used behind the array antenna to maximize the illumination in the desired space and absorptive materials installed surrounding the desired space, in order to minimize the illumination of the undesired space surrounding the desired space.

Moreover, a shielding grounded enclosure receives containers holding articles with UHF RFID tags with codes to be read out in a multi-read operation is disclosed in <CIT>.

The reader of Patent Literature <NUM>, however, requires a troublesome operation such as placing products in the housing and closing the lid for checkout, and then opening the lid and taking out the products. Customers are not allowed to visually check the contents of the shopping basket accommodated in the housing, so that they fail to reconfirm the products during the checkout process. That is, the convenience of the customers is impaired.

In this way, it has been difficult to balance between ensuring customer's convenience and reducing the impact of radio waves. Such problems can occur not only with readers used for checkout process, but also with stationary devices that read RF tags attached to articles.

In view of the above-described problems, the present invention provides a reader that reduces the impacts of radio waves while keeping the convenience during reading.

To achieve the above, the present invention relates to a reader that reads information from a RF tag attached to an article. The reader is configured according to claim <NUM>.

According to the present invention, the antenna is housed in the shield. This suppresses the spread of radio waves emitted from the antenna and thus reduces the impacts of radio waves on other devices. The shield has an opening larger than an article, so that a user can place an article in the shield or place an article above the opening for reading of the RF tag. Reading is performed while keeping the shield open, and this does not require troublesome operations such as closing the opening as in the conventional one. The present invention therefore reduces the impacts of radio waves while keeping the convenience during reading.

Referring to the drawings, the following describes some embodiments of a reader and an information providing system according to the present invention.

As shown in <FIG>, the information providing system <NUM> according to the present embodiment is used in a store that sells a product P such as clothing. At the store, a RF tag <NUM> is attached to each product P together with a price tag. As shown in <FIG>, the RF tag <NUM> includes an antenna <NUM> and an IC chip <NUM> having a built-in communication circuit (not shown) that communicates with a reader/writer <NUM> via the antenna <NUM>. The IC chip <NUM> has a built-in CPU (not shown) and memory (not shown), and the memory stores unique information (hereinafter referred to as "tag information") defined so as to uniquely identify the RF tag <NUM>.

Referring back to <FIG>, products P each to which the RF tag <NUM> is attached are displayed on the shelves and tables in the store so that customers select the products P they like and put them in their shopping baskets B. There are needs to understand the total price of a plurality of products P in the shopping basket B during the shopping. To meet the needs, the information providing system <NUM> according to the present embodiment uses a reader <NUM> that reads the tag information of the RF tags <NUM> to display the total price of the products P in the shopping basket B with a mobile terminal <NUM> of a clerk S.

The following describes the reader <NUM> and the mobile terminal <NUM> in detail.

The reader <NUM> is a stationary device that communicates with the RF tag <NUM> attached to each product P in the shopping basket B to read the tag information. The reader <NUM> includes a housing <NUM> as shown in <FIG>. The housing <NUM> has a rectangular bottom plate <NUM> that is larger than the outer shape defined with the edges of the shopping basket B. Four wall plates <NUM> (<FIG>) standing perpendicular to the bottom plate <NUM> are joined to the edges of the bottom plate <NUM>. Each wall plate <NUM> extends vertically up to about the height of an adult's waist, and their vertical edges are mutually joined. These four wall plates <NUM> (<FIG>) and bottom plate <NUM> define the rectangular housing <NUM> that opens upward.

Two horizontal plates <NUM> and <NUM> are provided above and below inside the housing <NUM>. The upper horizontal plate <NUM> is detachably supported with shelf supports <NUM>. This horizontal plate <NUM> is a rectangular plate, on which a shopping basket (<FIG>) containing the products P (<FIG>) is placed, and is located at a height adjusted so that the shopping basket B is housed within the enclosure defined with the wall plates <NUM>. In other words, the horizontal plate <NUM> functions as a place, on which the shopping basket B is put. The lower horizontal plate <NUM> adheres to the inner wall surfaces of the wall plates <NUM>. An antenna <NUM> of the reader/writer <NUM> is placed on the horizontal plate <NUM>. These horizontal plates <NUM> and <NUM>, wall plates <NUM>, and bottom plate <NUM> are made of wood.

Each wall plate <NUM> has an inner wall surface <NUM>, and on a part of the inner wall surface <NUM> that is above the horizontal plate <NUM>, a radio wave reflection sheet <NUM> is attached. The radio wave reflection sheet <NUM> is made of metal such as aluminum, and functions as a radio wave reflection layer that reflects radio waves on its surface. A radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> is attached on the entire inner surface of the radio wave reflection sheet <NUM>. The radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> is made of a mixture of magnetic metal powder with a rubber material, and functions as a radio wave absorption layer that absorbs radio waves inside the sheet. The radio wave reflection sheet <NUM> is attached also to the upper surface of the horizontal plate <NUM>, and the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> is attached to this radio wave reflection sheet <NUM>. Thus, the radio wave reflection sheet <NUM> and the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> on each wall plate <NUM> and the horizontal plate <NUM> make up a shield <NUM> that accommodates the antenna <NUM> and has an opening <NUM> facing upward.

These shield <NUM> and horizontal plate <NUM> define a space for accommodating the shopping basket B. In other words, the shield <NUM> and the horizontal plate <NUM> function as a container <NUM> for accommodating the shopping basket B.

The internal space below the horizontal plate <NUM> is the space where a main body <NUM> of the reader/writer <NUM> is installed, and the lower parts of the four wall plates <NUM> and the bottom plate <NUM>, which define this space, function as a base <NUM>. The horizontal plate <NUM>, and the radio wave reflection sheet <NUM> and the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> attached to the horizontal plate <NUM> have a through hole <NUM> penetrating these plate and sheets. The antenna <NUM> and the main body <NUM> installed on the bottom plate <NUM> are electrically connected via wiring <NUM> passing through this through hole <NUM>.

As shown in <FIG>, the main body <NUM> of the reader/writer <NUM> includes: a CPU <NUM>; a memory <NUM>; a communication circuit <NUM> (transmission/reception circuit, oscillation circuit, modulation/demodulation circuit) for communicating with the RF tags <NUM> via the antenna <NUM>; and a wifi module <NUM>. The CPU <NUM> executes a program in the memory <NUM> to collectively or individually acquire the tag information from the RF tags <NUM> via the communication circuit <NUM> and the antenna <NUM>, and transmit the tag information to the mobile terminal <NUM> with the wifi module <NUM>.

The mobile terminal <NUM> is a smart device such as a tablet terminal or a smartphone owned by a clerk S (<FIG>) at the store. As shown in <FIG>, the mobile terminal <NUM> is implemented with a computer mainly including a CPU <NUM>, a memory <NUM>, a wifi module <NUM>, a liquid crystal display <NUM>, and a touch sensor <NUM>.

The memory <NUM> stores an information providing program <NUM>. The information providing program <NUM> defines a product table <NUM> in advance. The product table <NUM> associates product information such as the name, size, and price of each product P (<FIG>) for all of the products P in the store with corresponding tag information. This means that the computer having the memory <NUM> functions as a storage <NUM> (<FIG>) that stores the product information in association with the tag information.

The information providing program <NUM> further defines the processing to provide information about the products P to customers, and the CPU <NUM> executes this processing. Specifically, the CPU <NUM> executes an acquisition step, an information creation step, and an output step in this order.

As described above, the present embodiment is configured so that, as shown in <FIG>, when the shopping basket B is set in the container <NUM> of the reader <NUM>, the reader <NUM> reads tag information of each product P while keeping the container <NUM> open, and the mobile terminal <NUM> displays information to be provided (including the list and the total price).

The reader <NUM> of the present embodiment described above completes the preparation for reading the RF tag <NUM> with a simple operation such as putting the shopping basket B into the container <NUM> through the opening <NUM>. At the time of reading (communication), the customer is allowed to reconfirm the products P by seeing the products P in the shopping basket B through the opening <NUM>.

The shield <NUM> making up the container <NUM> suppresses the spread of radio waves emitted from the antenna <NUM> of the reader/writer <NUM> to the surrounding of the reader <NUM>, and thus reduces the impacts of the radio waves on other devices. This also suppresses entering of the radio waves from other devices surrounding the reader <NUM> into the container <NUM>, thereby reducing degradation of reading accuracy caused by the interference of the radio waves.

As shown in <FIG>, the shield <NUM> includes the radio reflection sheet <NUM> located outside and surrounding the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM>. This leads to excellent shielding performance for radio waves with the shield <NUM>, because weak radio waves leaked from the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM> is reflected by the radio wave reflection sheet <NUM>, and is absorbed inside the radio wave absorption sheet <NUM>. As a result, the communication area with the RF tags <NUM> is limited to the container <NUM> and the area above the container <NUM>, and this does not cause a failure such as erroneous reading of the tag information on the RF tag <NUM> for a product P located around the reader <NUM>.

That is a description of the reader and the information providing system according to the present invention by way of the embodiment. The present invention is not limited to the above-stated embodiment, and may include the following embodiments, for example.

Claim 1:
A reader (<NUM>) that reads information from a RF tag attached to an article, comprising:
an antenna (<NUM>) that radiates radio waves to communicate with the RF tag; and
a shield (<NUM>) that accommodates the antenna placed on a bottom side and has an opening larger than a shopping basket and facing upward,
the reader reading information from the RF tag while keeping the shield open, and the shield is characterised by including
a radio wave absorption layer (<NUM>) that absorbs the radio waves; and
a radio wave reflection layer (<NUM>) disposed on an outside of the radio wave absorption layer, the radio wave reflection layer reflecting the radio waves,
wherein
of the radio wave absorption layer and the radio wave reflection layer, which extend from the opening toward the antenna, the radio wave reflection layer extends longer than the radio wave absorption layer does.