Identification technology

Industrial laser machines are created primarily to serve industrial production lines, particularly applications for surface treatment of metal and non-metal that many previous methods has not done well. Due to the non-contact processing and outstanding benefits of quality namely durability permanently, and economic consumption during processing, laser marker is now the top criterion for choice of businesses and manufacturers in all industries.

In industrial laser marking, four marking methods are commonly used:

• Engraving
• Annealing
• Color change
• Surface removal

Each method complies with a certain principles to creat different effects on materials and brings a certain benefit depending on users’ demand.

In particular, one of the modern and newly applications is laser marking on plastic card in identification industry. Recently, laser technology has also been applied thoroughly and efficiently to mark security information on special cards used in government, state-own companies, etc through applications such as Passport, Visa, driving license, ID card …

In this application, the industrial laser marker may maximize the advantage of the ability to change color of information, pictures, and mark Tactile on card with high durability and protection against any possible counterfeit.

Laser Marking of Smart Cards

Typical applications are marking of Smart Cards such as ID cards and credit cards. The possibilities of laser marking covers photos, text and/or barcodes. There are basically two different ways of laser marking these cards.

• Color Change

Due to the extreme short pulses, the lower layer of so called multi layer cards can be marked by changing the color of the pigments without touching the transparent top layer. Even high-resolution, greyscale images are possible. More important, the marks on cards is difficult to be erased, smudged under the impact of the external environment, which improves the durability of the card and increases security for all purposes. On the other hand, laser marker can make portraits of cardholders with special gray-level, high-resolution, and extrmely clear.

• Tactile Marking

Tactile laser marking creates a kind of recast on the top layer and are the popular application of the industrial laser marker. This application is quitely common for electronic payment cards of the developed countries in Europe. The information commonly made by the laser mainly are names, account numbers, card numbers, etc and may reduce counterfeit of cards.

Benefits:

• Fraud safe
• High marking speed
• High quality

Therfore, it may be said that industrial laser marker has played an increasingly important role through its flexible applicability in all industrial sectors. In particular, the identification industry has contributed to discover a new field of laser technology and vice versa, laser technology has brought more practical benefits for processing and personalization for the security plastic cards than other previous methods.