Drink up that beer -- another will soon be whisked to the table thanks to a hi-tech pint¹ glass that tells bar staff when it needs refilling.

Developed by a Japanese electronics company, the intelligent glass is fitted with a radio-frequency coil in its base and emits a signal to a receiver set in the table when it's empty, New Scientist magazine reported Thursday.

The iGlassware system works by coating each glass with a clear, conducting material, enabling it to measure exactly how much liquid has been sipped² or guzzled³.

When empty, the glass sends an electronic cry for more beer from the table to waiters equipped with hand-held computers on frequencies similar to those used by mobile phones.

A team from the Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories working in Cambridge, Massachusetts has made the first prototypes, but may find it hard to sell the idea to Britons.

"It sounds like a fun idea, but I don't think it would work in our pubs," said a spokesman for J.D. Wetherspoon, which runs over 500 pubs in Britain.

"The tradition in Britain is to get up and go to the bar for a round of drinks, not to have a waiter bring beers to the table, no matter how quickly," he said.