How a 1970s Toll Device Became the Blueprint for Modern IoT

Mario Cardullo's 1973 RFID patent introduced a design principle—passive, battery-free tags powered entirely by the reader's radio signal—that remains fundamental to IoT and contactless technology today. This elegant solution to power constraints demonstrates why respecting hardware limitations often yields more durable and scalable designs than feature-rich complexity. For modern builders, it's a timeless reminder that the simplest, most constraint-aware architecture often wins at scale.