Messages in a 'smart bottle'

In late 2014, multinational alcoholic beverages company Diageo established Diageo Technology Ventures, a program designed to solve some of the company’s business challenges and unlock new opportunities for growth by working with emerging technology companies.

The program’s first initiative - a ‘smart bottle’ of Johnnie Walker Blue Label - is about to be unveiled. A collaboration between Diageo and Thin Film Electronics, the connected smart bottle aims to enhance the consumer experience by using printed sensor tags featuring Thin Film’s OpenSense technology, which can detect both the sealed and opened state of each bottle. The tags and the sensor information they contain will allow Diageo to send targeted and timely marketing messages, whether at retail or after purchase, such as promotional offers, cocktail recipes and exclusive content to consumers who read the tags with their smartphones.

Thin Film’s technology makes use of smartphones’ near field communication (NFC) capabilities. The technology allows Diageo to track bottle movements across the supply chain, in-store and to the point of consumption, with the sensor tags remaining readable even when the factory seal has been broken, providing an additional layer of security in protecting the authenticity of the product.

“We constantly experiment with the latest cutting-edge technologies to enrich and enhance the experiences delivered by our iconic brands. Our collaboration with Thin Film allows us to explore all the amazing new possibilities enabled by smart bottles for consumers, retailers and our own business, and it sets the bar for technology innovation in the drinks industry,” said Helen Michels, global innovation director, Futures Team at Diageo.

“Diageo can reap the benefits of the intelligence gleaned from our smart sensors and create engaging experiences for its customers. This is how we will begin to build the real Internet of Everything,” said Davor Sutija, Thin Film CEO.