Intelligent Product 3.0: Decentralised AI Agents and Web3 Intelligence Standards

The "Intelligent Product" was first introduced as a way to embed intelligence within everyday objects, enabling them to assess and influence their own destiny (Wong et al., 2002). The concept built on the technologies and infrastructure being developed at the Auto-ID Center (Sarma et al., 2000), notably the Electronic Product Code (EPC) for Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), along with related standards for storing and communicating product data. However, this predated blockchain, while the Internet of Things (IoT), a term also coined at the Auto-ID Center by Kevin Ashton (Ashton, 2009), and the Internet itself were still in their infancy as communication platforms. Embedded AI, primarily implemented through software agents, remained largely a research tool at the time. As a result, truly autonomous and fully intelligent products were not attainable until recent innovations in blockchain, Web3, and artificial intelligence. This paper revisits the original vision and specification of the Intelligent Product, charts its refinement over the years, and demonstrates how these emerging capabilities have paved the way for Intelligent Product 3.0. 1