For several years, 2-D barcodes have been part of everyday life for mobile phone owners in Japan. Walking through a clothing store, for example, a smartphone user might scan a 2-D barcode from a label with the device's camera, using a specialist app that immediately links them to a URL embedded in the code.

Now, as businesses explore the scope of potential applications - and smartphones become ubiquitous - the wider roll out of 2-D barcodes seems imminent.

Most prevalent in Japan in the form of QR (quick response) codes, these mobile tags are packed with information. Developed in 1994 by Japanese automotive parts manufacturer Denso, and originally used to track inventory, the codes are now most commonly used in marketing. Major advertisers such as Pepsi, Volvo and BMW have introduced them into European campaigns during the last 12 months.

Other recorded uses of 2-D barcodes have been less obvious: on gravestones; in a book made up entirely of QR codes; and - perhaps more useful for the CIO - in transactional documents, to speed up basic business processes.

Although QR codes remain the standard in Japan, European and US software developers are getting in on the act. Since January 2009, Microsoft has been beta testing its Microsoft Tag, which, by introducing colour into the matrix, allows more information to be packed into a smaller area. Nokia is working on Point & Find, which goes beyond the need for unsightly codes eating up prime advertising real estate. The mobile app recognises images (for example, a movie poster) and takes the user directly to relevant internet content.

For interested parties in Europe, the main issue now is whether to skip the comparatively clunky QR standard and move directly to these more advanced forms.

DATA FEED

• 78% of Japanese people have a mobile phone with a QR code reading function.
  

  (Source: Marsh Inc, 2009)

• The most common places from which people read QR codes are: advertising leaflets (58%), computer displays (56%) and printed media (51%).
  

  (Source: Marsh Inc, 2009)

• German advertising agency Lukas Lindemann Rosinski ran a campaign for myToys.de in 2008 that featured QR codes made from Lego bricks. They have reported impressive results: 49% of visitors at the relevant pages within myToys.de were directed there via the campaign; and sales of the Lego sets being advertised in this way were double those not being advertised.