The glaring weak spot in the otherwise positive outlook is the depressed automotive industry. If this segment, including all the various suppliers connected to vehicle production, is removed from the calculation, ABI predicts a growth rate of 16%.

Strong growth areas include contactless ticketing and payment applications, item-level tracking for the apparel industry, and baggage handling. More specifically, the contactless payment category is expected to see strong growth in the U.S. first, followed by Europe.These applications create a demand across all segments of the RFID industry, from hardware including tags and readers, to software and services.

Asset management solutions, already seeing expanded use in rental industries such as libraries and laundry services, are expected to see more frequent adoption in other areas, including health care, finance, and manufacturing.

ABI also predicts that the RFID-enabled identification market, which has experienced a slowdown lately as China’s massive national ID project is completed, will heat up in 2010 as a number of countries adopt electronic passports along with other forms of RFID-enabled IDs, from border-crossing cards to electronic vehicle registration systems.