Just like those pioneering days of what we would now
fondly call Web 1.0,
radio frequency identification (RFID) is now reaching a point
where forward-thinking companies are aware of it. The problem is
that they are still trying to see how their businesses can benefit
from the technology and gain a return on investment.
Every new technology needs standard-bearers. Remember
Lastminute.com,
eBay and
Amazon as the leaders in the web world. For RFID 1.0, it has
been Wal-Mart, Tesco and Metro in retail and consumer goods Hong
Kong and San Francisco airports for baggage handling
Marks & Spencer for clothes labelling DHL for asset
tracking and logistics and the US Department of Defense and
Wal-Mart for driving supplier adoption.
Yet even for these RFID pioneers, there have been hurdles to
overcome. For example, DHL has so far shied away from switching
from barcodes to RFID labels to track packages internally because
it cannot be sure of the read rates. Ninety-nine per cent may sound
pretty good, but it is still not good enough for DHL to have one in
every 100 packages unaccounted for. Tesco too has had some issues,
notably with EU standards and the UHF spectrum within which RFID
tags and readers operate.
A string of unfamiliar names across all sectors have also
embraced the technology. A Paris-based law firm is using RFID to
track documents a Malaysian museum is using it to track artefacts,
and a Czech hospital is using RFID to track vials of chemotherapy
medication. RFID is even being primed for use in monitoring the
hand-washing rigour of US healthcare employees to prevent the
spread of infections.
Despite those successes, some high-profile projects are not
using RFID. Heathrow Terminal 5, for example, was expected to use
RFID for its baggage handling operations, but instead went for 3D
barcodes.
RFID is a technology that IT departments must be aware of
because they will need to upgrade their infrastructure to cope with
it. Three areas must be addressed: data management, network and
end-user device management, and sensor management. And all three
elements must be tied together and integrated with legacy
systems.
My "Tune into RFID" blog will give a flavour of where RFID is
moving beyond pilots and trials to deliver business-critical
benefits. It will also discuss the impact of how the volume of data
generated by RFID will be handled within IT and the business the
development of standards such as Electronic Product Code
Information Services (a way for supply chain partners to share and
exchange information efficiently) the security of RFID tags, and
the ongoing debate between the use of "active" and "passive"
tags.
It is still a long journey to reach the RFID equivalent of Web
2.0, but it is going to be fun getting there.
Tune into RFID blog >>
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