Wake-up everybody--this article appears in a reputable business newspaper- Business Week! Does the article or journalist give the issue the more credibility? You decide!
Human-Chip Company Plans IPO
While the NAIS remains voluntary on a federal level, and there is no formal people identification system as yet, both executives are moving aggressively to position their companies for the day when chips in animals and people are the norm rather than the exception. Mary Zanoni, a lawyer and critic of NAIS who has written extensively about the system, says that "the microchipping of livestock and pet animals is intended to make tagging more acceptable in helping these companies market their devices for people."McGrath's company, Digital Angel (DOC), does nearly $60 million in annual sales and has sold several million chips for attachment to livestock, mostly in the U.S. and Canada.
Silverman's company,VeriChip Corp., is preparing for widespread marketing of its people chips with an initial public offering that it expects to complete within the next 60 days.
It has begun building what he refers to as "the infrastructure" by signing up more than 400 hospitals to adopt system scanners and databases and about 1,200 physicians to make chips available to patients likeliest to benefit from them, such as diabetics. ("The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has granted a patent for the product, which could serve a worldwide market of 230,000 million people with diabetes.")
While McGrath and Silverman aren't related, their companies are. Digital Angel and VeriChip have the same majority owner. Applied Digital Solutions (ADSX), the parent of seven smaller companies, owns 55% of Digital Angel and all of VeriChip.
Remember the Infant Protection from VeriChip?
A listing of their press releases. See a pattern yet?
Read Animal Tags for People: The Real Prize
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