I know this may be old news to some of the GPS enthusiasts of the world, but there is this company from New Zealand that is making some really ridiculously small GPS tracking chips – and I mean ridiculously small. The company’s name is Rakon, and they make GPS chips for all sorts of things, but most of their chips are geared toward GPS cell phone market. The fact that these chips are so small is important for all those in the GPS tracking community for several different reasons, the least of which is that small GPS chips are freakin’ cool. The others mainly have to do with the future of GPS tracking.
But before we get into all the cool future stuff, let’s understand a little bit about the GPS chips that Rankon is putting out there. These are powerful chips that function at some of the highest levels in the consumer grade GPS tracking products. They do an excellent job at handling weak signal and dynamic environments, enabling maximum GPS performance when you need it most. Their chips work indoor and outdoors, under tree canopies or in canyons, on country roads or beneath sky scrappers. And the best part about these chips is that they are really small. One GPS chip comes in at 2.5 mm x 2.0 mm – yeah, that is right, millimeters. That is 0.09843 inches x 0.07874 inches for all those who live in backward countries that still use the imperial system.
Needless to say, when a cell phone company wants a small GPS tracking chip to install in their cell phone they are going to consider the folks at Rankon.
But it is pretty obvious that people who want to create GPS tracking cell phones are going to look for a small GPS chip. They want to conserve space inside their phone so that they can make is as slim and sleek as possible. Consumers want something that is going to be easy to use – meaning that it is lightweight but sturdy, small but not too small, powerful but not power hungry, and full of features (like GPS navigation and GPS tracking) but not too hard to use – and by giving them a small chip to use in the phone a company like Rankon is empowering phone creators to dream big with their phone designs.
This is the cool factor of this technology right now, but there is a lot of potential upside to having really small GPS chips for the future. One is that this technology can be used to help people keep track of their pets. Small GPS tracking chips for dogs could be implanted somewhere under the skin on the back of the dog and if coupled with the right technology this could provide real time GPS tracking of the pet’s whereabouts on a 24/7 basis.
The extra technology that you would need to generate to make something like this isn’t too hard to dream up. You would just need an ability to communicate wirelessly with a cell phone tower. This is technology that is already being made smaller and smaller. Today there are watches, which are much smaller than cell phones, that have the ability to make phone calls over the wireless networks that dot the countrysides of the world. I can only see this technology getting smaller and smaller too until one day it fits within a 2.5 mm x 2 mm space.
The next technology that would be needed will be some sort of power supply that is renewable and persistent. That way the small GPS tracking chip and the cell phone transmission component could be in constant use – giving it its 24/7 real time tracking capabilities. For this, I can think of two solutions. The first is to make this power source solar – so during the day the device works off the sun and then during the night is runs off stored power from during the day. This is probably a less than ideal solution since batteries never seem to have an infinite life cycle – heck, some batteries can’t even last a few months let alone 10-14 years that a dog is alive. The second solution is much better but much harder as far as I know – it is to harness the heat produced by the dog and use it to power the two devices.
This would be an incredible solution and would allow for tracking of all sorts of animal life. You could use it in a dog, but you could also tag all warm blooded animals with this type of GPS tracking chip and cell phone device combination in order to get huge amounts of position information for use in scientific research. Our ability to understand the movements of our companions here on this earth would grow at an incredibly pace.
This type of technology would also make these GPS tracking chips for children too. In fact, it would probably enable a future society to be able to know the exact location of every person in the world at the exact same time! If I wanted to get all 1984-esque, if there was a small microphone on the cell phone component then you would know where everyone in the world was and what they were talking about at any given moment. Now that would be something.
So in one way it is really cool that GPS tracking chips keep getting smaller and smaller, but in another way it is really creepy and a little unnerving. I know that technology is essentially amoral, but people sure as hell aren’t and I would hate to see what people would end up doing with this type of GPS tracking.
{ 34 comments… read them below or add one }
I would never ever put that life threatening chip into my skin. The government is a living demon who wants to control everyone and invade everyone’s privacy for the sake of what? Safety? No thanks, it said this would happened in the Bible its all fun and games until everyone with Chips begins to die of infection.
Hi Erik,
I don’t think I’d put a chip like that into my skin either, especially if it is one that is going to be installed by the government. There are still a ton of technological hurdles for scientists to overcome before implantable GPS tracking chips become a reality, so I wouldn’t worry too much about it if I were you. It is all still a long way off.
-Joe
hi
I am looking to use it in laptop can i ?
and how ?
I wish this company would get with it already. They developed this thing in like 2006. Many many many have been interested in buying it and inserting it into a host of different objects. But it’s not available….not on a consumer level or commercial level. I’ve wanted to buy their stock for awhile now but can’t force myself to do it seeing how they refuse to develope this into a marketable product. Hell, it’s marketable as is. Most people want to make their own casing/coverings for it. And just want to buy the chip. If you search the internet for “worlds smallest gps tracking devices” the smallest they have is the size of a pager. Far to big for many of the purposes it is needed for. Anyway, sell the damn thing already.
Hi Jess,
That is kind of lame that this chip has not hit the market yet. I guess I assumed that it was already in things like cell phones and smaller GPS tracking devices because it seemed like such a perfect fit for them, but hearing that it is not is kind of mind boggling. Why make the world’s smallest GPS tracking chip and not sell it for people to use?
That just doesn’t make any sense.
-Joe
I think this is a great idea especially for personal items you want to find if lost or stolen. I was robbed this weekend and they took my personal dayplanner with an unimaginable amount of personal and business information within. I sure would have like to have had a tracker chip in that book so I could find it again and procecute the person(s) that got it and several other personal items out of my vehicle. I plan on looking for one (or more) for my replacement dayplanner, and other items, immediately. If anyone has information on a supplier, please forward the information to me as soon as possible. Thanks. Danny
I love the comment from Erik that it said this would happen in the Bible. I wonder what version of the bible Erik got this from… seeing that this type of telecommunications was hardly standard over the large period of history that the bible was written? Could you clarify Erik, is it the old or the new testament and what chapter also pls?
GPS tracking has made our life more different,when you install the Car tracker,you can know exactly of you car ,when the theft want s to stole it can alert.and if it is installed in a child ,you can find him when he got lost.you can contact them by SMS/GPRS, it means you can do it by mobile or the internet.very convenient.nowadays, al ot of businessman do this kind of trade.they import the sell to the customers.for more infomation,we can disuss just send me email or add me MSN:oneralarm02@gmail.com
Danny et al – I would also like to get my hands on a gps chip that can be installed on equipment to track in the event of it going missing. I suppose this can be done today but you have to pay expensive subscription charges when you may only want to track the unit for a short period of time. Let me know at stevemac@ireland.com if anyone comes up with any suggestions.
I really want little GPS chips for my dogs! I don’t think the traditional I.D. chip is good enough… especially if someone finds your dog, thinks she’s cute, and decides to keep her! I would really like to be able to track my dogs down, especially since we travel a lot, and my dogs are really freakin’ cute!!!
I would love this! If a evil dictator or someone had control over it, I’d be worried. Otherwise it is a brilliant idea.
Especially for my dog who likes to bolt out the door every chance he gets.
I would also like to get some more information about the gps chip .I am in the police and it will help us a lot with stock theft. Pls. let me know.
Ha Ha Ha
Erik is funny………..
SeanM is hillarious too……..
We already have one that can track a cell phone,car just about anything or anyone.Our monthly fee is less then you think! Let me know if you would like more info storagerandy@yahoo.com
Hi
I just want to know what the once off fee will be on the chip that you advertise
Kind regards natacha
Hi
I just want to know what is the cost for a tacking chip.
Kind Regards
Natacha
Hi Natacha,
I am not sure what a GPS tracking chip is going to cost. Most of the time companies buy the tracking chips for use inside some other type of electronic device – like a cell phone or a navigation GPS. They are not typically sold to consumers for consumption. If you want a device that will track through GPS then I would suggest buying one of the devices that already has one of these chips installed.
-Joe
hi i just wana know were cn one bay that small cheap..please help me.
Hello Salim,
I would assume that you would want to contact the manufacturer to see if you could buy one from them directly or from one of their preferred vendors. I’m not sure if they will sell them to consumers, but if you are a business representative I am sure that they would love to hear from you.
-Joe
first off, they already have chips that you can install in dogs, atleast in this “backwards country that still uses the imperial system,” a family friend owns world champion frisbee dogs and the gps helped the veterinarian who found him locate the owner, second, if you have received a U.S. passport recently, its tracked, any late model vehicle, being tracked, chevy actually advertises its gps tracking and locator services. fact is, if Rankon is not selling it’s version of the small chip, it is most likely selling some other version of a chip or it would most likely not still be in business, so much other technology is being crammed into handheld devices that manufacturers have no use for a chip any bigger than 1.5 square inches. It wont be long before everyone can track anyone or anything from any source. And as far as the day planner goes, password protection, otherwise you are foolishly putting yours and your businesses information at risk.
Hi Jeremy H,
I really don’t think that there is a real time GPS tracking device that you can install in (as in inside) a dog. Real time GPS tracking not only requires a power source to power the GPS component of the tracker but also the cell phone modem or radio transmitter. Most consumer grade batteries would go out in just a couple of days under this load, making the GPS installed inside the dog – or any other living being – useless without some sort of procedure to get new batteries in and the old batteries out.
I am almost certain that you are talking about an RF chip that was installed inside your friend’s frisbee dogs. These chips simply store information like the address and phone number of the owner, the name of the pet, etc. They are not GPS tracking chips and they certainly do not track pets in real time.
As to your comment about Passports being tracked – I have no doubt that the passport is tracked using RF technology, but this certainly is not real-time GPS tracking nor is it any other type of GPS tracking.
Also, not all cars have a built in GPS tracking device in them. You are simply mistaken in this assertion. While more and more cars are getting things like OnStar and other GPS tracking systems with the trend for this type of technology to become standard on all makes and models it is not yet the universal norm. It might be one day, just not today.
I think you are right in suggesting that we are soon going to be able to track anyone at anytime because our devices will increasingly become wireless and interconnected. It is simply a matter of before this happens.
Thanks for the comment and for stopping by!
-Joe
Backwards country that still uses the imperial system? What a douchebag!!! Yeah, we backwards people know nothing here in the USA, I guess splitting the atom before anyone else definitely keeps us in that “backwards” category.
Hey Tanya,
It is true the the USA has done a lot to advance science. It is also true that scientists exclusively use the metric system. The reason for this is that it is better and makes more sense than the imperial system.
-Joe
Extreme situations demand extreme measures! Should Erik be in the shoes of so many parents around the world who lose their kids and no Amber Alert whatsoever can trace them or bring them back then I think he would reconsider the transdermal GPS chip technology. Madeleine was never found. Thomas is still missing. Olivia too. Tobias, Angeline, Karmen, Jurito; the number of missing and/or abducted innocent children is rising EVERY SECOND. Most of these children have their vital organs removed and left to die under conditions that guys like Erik can NEVER come close even if they use their wildest imagination!!! I don’t give a dime what the “Holy” bible says. This book is nothing but a SHIELD used by those who don’t KNOW what’s out there! This is my opinion and I intend to inject not ONE but multiple gps chips to my children in fear of battery shortage one day. Erik’s children? I leave them to his (ir)responsibility. This is Davina from Greece, greetings.
@Danny
I can relate to this, my PSP got stolen about two days ago, some thugs tried to knock me out for it but they ended up just grabbing it out of my pocket and running off with it, When I but my replacement, I want to install a GPS tracker in it, and all of my personal valuables. If anyone has any info on where to purchases such devices, please let me know.
@tanya
You realize of course the US had the help of such great minds like Albert Einstein in Project Manhattan right, I’m not sure if he was directly involved, though I know there was an enormous influx of German scientist who did help in this research. and the Imperial system really is a backwater system, metrics kick ass, base 10 rules!!!
hello i live in Belize city, its a beautiful place but it is violent for local people. I have been robbed 3 times twice at gun point the latest time a good friend (Female) of mine got pistil whipped i mean what man does that to a girl. But to my point can anyone tell me were I can get a GPS tracking chips for my cellphone; I am tiered of having lose all my info and pics to imbeciles and having to start all over! please can anyone help me…
Hi Mike.A,
A lot of cell phones already have a GPS tracking chip installed in them, at least here in the United States. So what I would do first is find out if your phone already is GPS capable. You can do this by searching you cell phone in Google or some similar search engine with the word “GPS” after or before it. If your phone is already GPS capable then all it will take is installing some GPS tracking software and you should be good to go.
All you will need is for the criminals to keep your cell phone on and the tracking program will lead you right to them as long as the phone remains on and in service.
-Joe
i would like to know more about this small chip
Hi Ike,
For more information I would recommend contact the manufacturer of this GPS tracking chip directly.
-Joe
Hi y’all, I’m from Kentucky.
Joe, thank you for an intriguing article! While noting that the following is an off-topic subject, I must address it:
Imperial verses Metric
Our monetary system in the USA is base 10: 100 pennies to one dollar. Mathematical computations around the world are the same. The only real difference between the imperial and metric system is in how measurements are determined, such as weight, distance, volume, and temperature. To understand this difference, take a look at these two identical questions…
1) What is .037 quarts in ounces? Answer: 1.184 ounces. Try measuring that with titration.
2)What is .037 liters? Answer: 37 milliliters, simply move the decimal point.
In short, the metric system is the standardized way for the global scientific and medical communities to stay on the same page. Now if you will excuse me, I’m a gonna climb up to the top of that yonder cliff, and pick me a mess (two or so pints) of blueberries!
Where can i buy a few for my l;aptop cell phone and ipods
if you know email me at javiflorpez@yahoo.com
I want this chip to monitor my laptops & computers. I’ve just lost 28 computers in june eithout a trace can you help me
Hi, I have application ideas for your GPS -chip, if we would need 3pcs, 5 pcs or 10 pcs to do product prototyping… how can we would with you? I am a Singaporean young entrepreneur… creative, innovative, enterprising, risk-taker…
Zen