Alchemy Print Engine

Take the intelligent approach to smart label printing.

Zebra's patent-pending Alchemy™ technology enables a single print station to produce RFID smart labels and conventional bar code labels on demand-without having to stop operations to change label material. Label formatting software resident in the printer manages the entire process for convenient, high-throughput print operations. Alchemy is an ideal solution for operations that must support both "EPC™-compatible" smart labeling and traditional bar code printing because it makes the most efficient use of smart label materials and protects productivity by eliminating the need for media changeovers.

Traditional smart label printers use specialty media that has RFID inlays layered into the label stock during the conversion process. Every label on the roll includes an RFID transponder, which is encoded as the label is being printed. The processes required to convert smart label inlays into printer stock adds significant cost to the total cost of each smart label-often more than the cost of the chip itself!

With Zebra Alchemy, companies can use almost any label material to create smart labels. The Zebra Alchemy print engine process encodes a separate RFID inlay and bonds it to the label material after the label is printed. This two-step process makes converted smart label material unnecessary, so you have the same full choice of cost-effective label material you have always enjoyed. With the label formatting software, you control which labels include RFID inlays and which do not, so no inlays are wasted on labels that do not need RFID.