Counterfeiting and the Microchip

Software maker SAP and microchip maker Intel will work together to encourage companies to adopt RFID technology. When will the luxury industry adopt these new techs? The recent developments regarding the lawsuits filed by luxury giants against e-Bay, Walmart, Target and even the Silk Market in Beijing show how protective these brands are of their image - and rightly so...
Counterfeit items are not the only problem plaguing these companies. It is difficult to admit it, but one also has to recognize losses in the millions in stolen goods. It is surprising that read/write identification tags are not yet part and parcel of the luxury goods item.
Applications to this type of hardware are numerous and many companies such as Motorola, Cisco and SAP are stepping up their position in Radio Frequency Identification, attributing the technology's move from startup into growth. End to end solutions exist already.
Apart from the obvious applications of supply chain tracking, inventory management and loss prevention, the luxury industry could adapt this kind of technology to personalise luxury items (personalise id chip once item purchased) as well as keep a record of te items repair history. To wage war on counterfeit items, customs could be equiped with tag readers to identify the real from the fake (sometimes quite difficult with the naked eye).
Basically this chip could save time and hassel in law suits, and diplomacy.
What is frequently omitted in tech descriptives of these products however, is the store operations side of things. Customer service being of the highest importance in luxury stores, staff will not have to worry about the logistics. They would not have to perform as many inventories (as the chips permit instant identification over a given space, even for large numbers of items) and be able to handle customers instead of identifying shoplifters (security functions can be integrated).
So what do these chips cost? from 25 cents to 100€ depending on it's fonctions.

Existing examples: de Grisogono