When large companies see a good thing in small companies in their industry, what happens?

Today partnerships...tomorrow acquisitions.

That's the conclusion of ABI Research. Recently it noted the growing number of partnerships between large players and small RFID companies:

"...we see, for instance, an OAT Systems partnering with Symbol Technologies, ADT and Hewlett-Packard. Acsis is another example, with its relationships with SAP and HP, Symbol and Intermec.

"These small companies can bring great value to the table," says Michielsen. "They are in a great position to complement their larger partners' skill-sets in broader areas such as enterprise resource planning, warehouse management systems or automatic data capture. They really understand RFID at the network edge and are now partnering with larger organizations that provide more enterprise focus, more company-wide integration services and global customer support. Not only do these smaller companies' products win accolades from end-users, but they themselves have end-user relationships, from earlier work on smaller projects. They must be taken seriously."

But partnerships may only be a way-station for RFID vendors. ABI Research forecasts that out-and-out acquisitions will become more common, and there will be major consolidation as larger vendors better understand where these small companies fit into their portfolios."