DELRAY BEACH, Fla.-Human RFID chipmaker VeriChip Corp. said it filed for an initial public offering. The company did not release information on the number of shares it will release or the share price.
A subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions Inc., VeriChip has come under fire recently by privacy advocates who claim the company’s human RFID chips could be unfairly, even dubiously used to collect information about people.
VeriChip develops and sells passive RFID systems for identification, as well as active RFID systems for locating and identifying. Recently, the company began marketing VeriMed, a patient identification system used to identify people who arrive in an emergency room and are unable to communicate. The human RFID microchip relays the patient’s medical history to hospital staff so that the patient can be treated with the appropriate care. Last month, VeriChip announced that 68 medical facilities, including 65 hospitals, had agreed to implement the VeriMed system for patient identification
The Food and Drug Administration cleared VeriChip’s products for medical use in October 2004.
Applied Digital plans to retain a majority interest in VeriChip in the IPO. Applied Digital develops identification and security products for people, animals, food vendors, government agencies, the military, and telecommunications and security vendors.
