The airline industry wants greater adoption of connected bag tags by 2020. (Bigstock Photo)

Impinj is looking to solve one of the most frustrating experiences in the modern world of travel, lost luggage.

The Seattle maker of connected tags for billions of items around the world today announced a new chip that will help airlines track bags and prevent them from getting lost. Impinj says its Monza R6-B chip is the first one specifically made for airline bag tracking and is designed to handle the issues that come with following luggage that travels great distances, stacks on top of other bags and is surrounded by all the metallic infrastructure in airports.

The airline industry as a whole is moving toward using radio-frequency identification, RFID for short, for tracking bags. A recent decree from the International Air Transport Association Board of Governors mandates the use of connected bag tags by 2020.

Connected bag tags are not exactly a new idea and some companies are already implementing the concept. Delta started using RFID to track luggage two years ago.

Impinj CEO Chris Diorio said the airline bag tag “rollout is one of the largest and fastest industry adoptions in the history of RFID.” IATA predicts that the move to tracked bags will save the airline industry $3 billion by 2023 in reduced costs thanks to not having to find lost bags.

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