Patent ID: 8461993

Claim:
A transponder apparatus, comprising: a main antenna element having a plurality of conductor elements, each of the conductor elements having a first end and a terminal end located opposite the first end along a length of the conductor element, wherein the first ends of each of said conductor elements are direct connection coupled to one another, and wherein the terminal end of each of the conductor elements is not directly attached to any other ones of the conductor elements; and a plurality of devices; wherein each of said devices includes an IC chip operatively coupled to a conductor, wherein each of said devices is positioned adjacent to the terminal end of a respective one of said conductor elements, wherein the conductor of each of said devices is capacitively coupled to the one of said conductor elements adjacent to which the device is positioned, wherein the conductor and the IC chip of each of said devices is not physically connected to the one of said conductor elements adjacent to which the device is positioned, wherein each of said conductor elements has a slot provided therein which provides an inductive reactance, and wherein the slot provided in each of said conductor elements begins adjacent to and extends all the way to the terminal end of the conductor element such that the terminal end comprises two separated conductor portions comprising two separate coupling points capacitively coupled to the conductor of the device that is positioned adjacent to the conductor element.