By Jerry Banks and David Hanny, co-authors of RFID Applied

RFID implementations are becoming very numerous as they offer an expected benefit over the present way of doing things. Used in the proper situation, RFID can provide a better way of doing business or enable a much more convenient procedure for the consumer or user of a system. In some situations users of software systems may not even know that they are using RFID. Because RFID is being integrated into the way we operate both individually and collectively, there are fewer clear boundaries concerning what constitutes the components of RFID. RF system elements can be as unique as the purpose to which they are being applied. For example, the set of RFID system components that benefit Airbus during its assembly process will be different than the RF data processing needs at Carrefour’s retail operations. This article explores the typical elements that make up RFID components. It also addresses areas where RFID is having a positive impact outside of what are typically considered fundamental RFID components.

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

It is hard to label any component of an RFID system as being more critical than any of the others. In past articles we have discussed the RFID tag, as well as, the RFID antenna hardware. Both of these fundamental pieces are integral parts of a working and efficient RFID system. The underlying technology, manufacturing quality, and correct deployment of tags and antennas are all important links in the chain. Without any of these pieces, the entire solution will fail. The RFID reader is just as important as these other pieces and may be seen as one of the toughest components to design, manufacture, and deploy correctly. The challenge encountered with RFID readers is that a reader must implement two interfaces. The first is the interface with the RFID tags. The second is the interface with the business network.

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

Under ideal conditions, the popular Alien Squiggle RFID tag can be read at a distance of approximately 20 meters. But what happens if it is placed behind a glass of water? What about placing it to the side, but adjacent to the glass of water? How about placing it in the water?

Answers to these and other questions will appear later, but suffice it to say that the readability of a tag is affected by the placement of the tag and its ambient environment.

By David C. Wyld, Contributing Editor

A recent research report from ABI Research projected that the overall systems revenue for RFID in the area of airline baggage handling will grow from $11.8 million in 2006 to an estimated $27.5 million in 2011, representing a compound annual growth rate of over 18%. From the perspective of Lorne Riley of the IATA: “It’s reaching the tipping point. The business case itself is relatively strong.” The business case is so strong precisely because luggage handling is proving to be an “Achille’s Heel” in their customer service equation.

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

The design of the antennas used by RFID tags and RFID readers is one of the most critical pieces in RFID infrastructure. This is because the antennas facilitate the communication between an RFID reader and a tag through free space. Both the reader and the tag utilize an antenna to transmit and receive data. In the case of passive RFID systems, the antennas have the added burden of being able to efficiently collect and radiate energy, respectively. Without well designed antennas there can be no efficient communication between the tags and readers, and, in the case of passive tags, there may not be enough energy to power the tag.

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

According to hospitality industry experts, every year in the United States, over $7 billion is lost due to “liquor shrinkage.” What is “liquor shrinkage?” It happens when bartenders give out free drinks, overpour intentionally making drinks too strong, or make mistakes as they mix cocktails. It also happens when bottles of liquor disappear from bar storage areas due to theft. It all adds up to a major alcohol problem.

In fact, industry analysts project that liquor shrinkage across the hospitality industry affects between 20 and 30 percent of alcohol stock. For banquet and reception operations, losses may range even higher. Thus, solving the liquor shrinkage problem can be vitally important to restaurant and bar managers, as they can not only control costs, they can recover lost revenue from otherwise unpaid drinks.

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

In late 2002, a Canadian woman set off an airport metal detector. When she was “wanded,” the metal detector consistently sounded when placed near her abdomen. She had undergone surgery four months earlier and had suffered from unexplained abdominal pain ever since. Several days after the airport incident, an x-ray of her abdomen revealed the presence of a 12-inch long, 2-inch wide surgical retractor.

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

If we put together a “Business Hall of Shame”, some of the first inductees would have to include the likes of Chairmen and CEOs behaving badly, such as the late Kenneth Lay of Enron, Bernie Ebbers of WorldCom, and Dennis Kozlowski of Tyco International. In reaction to the “fast and loose” accounting and oversight environment early in this decade that made possible the worst corporate scandals perhaps in American business history, Congress took action to restore investor confidence in the public securities market. It rather quickly enacted the Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act of 2002. The law is commonly referred to as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, named for the chief, bipartisan sponsors of the bill, Maryland Senator Paul Sarbanes and Ohio Representative Michael G. Oxley. In fact, in an era of divisive politics, Congress was amazingly unified, approving the final law by a vote of 423-3 in the House of Representatives and by a unanimous vote in the Senate. When President George W. Bush signed the bill into law on July 30, 2002, he proclaimed: “The era of low standards and false profits is over. No boardroom in America is above or beyond the law.”

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

In the previous article, “The principles of RFID: Active Tags,” we discussed a classification of RFID tag called the active tag. Even though the active tag has many applications, it does not get as much press as its sister, the passive tag. It isn’t hard to understand why this is the case. Passive tags are the darling of the retail industry and the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) because they are cheaper than active tags and disposable. Passive tags cost less because they do not require a battery to operate and are generally less expensive to manufacture. The most inexpensive passive tag is used in electronic article surveillance (EAS) systems. EAS tags are found in books, attached to clothes, and sealed inside DVD and compact disc cases, among many other applications. These types of tags only transmit an “I am here” signal when they are activated. They do not have the unique identifier that is usually associated with RFID technology but they do discourage would be shoplifters.

Old school price tags requirements create redundant expense for retailers and higher prices for consumers

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

This morning, you can take a time travel adventure without leaving your desk. We can go “back to the future,” to the grocery store of our Baby Boomer youth. There, you can pick-up a can of beans with a price sticker that reads sixty-nine cents. Then you can take that can to the checkout line, and a real, live it price manually on her register.

Believe it or not, for many this scenario is not a dream in the year 2007. Rather, it is a very real nightmare for retailers. In a significant part of the United States, grocery stores – and many other categories of retail stores – must still place individual price tags on almost every item they sell. This is because of state and local laws, commonly referred to as “item pricing laws” (IPLs). These regulations were largely enacted as consumer protection measures in the 1970s and 1980s to protect against overcharging due to checkout scanning errors.

Casinos turning to embedded chips to generate player and accounting data

By Stephen Barlas

Major gaming industry vendors are betting big on the use of RFID gaming chips. The first to lay its cards on the table is Las Vegas-based Progressive Gaming International Corp. Casinos in Louisiana, Minnesota, Las Vegas and Northern California are using Progressive’s TableLink chip tracking system, which includes an RFID reader at every table, antennas under each of a table’s seven playing positions and gaming chips with RFID inlays. Look for it at other games such as roulette and craps once Progressive develops a faster RFID semiconductor, says Tim Richards, the company’s executive director of marketing.

Galleries are tagging collections to improve inventory control, security, and the total customer experience

By Ryan Kline, Contributing Editor

After leaving a museum, you may think you are an expert on everything from painting to sculpture, but there are a lot of artifacts that you passed right by. It wasn’t that you went too fast and skipped over some unattractive pieces, many of the items you missed were out of sight, behind the walls in storage.

When the museum needs to find a particular piece of artwork for a special exhibition or to loan to another museum, the piece has to be manually located by searching the museum’s – often vast – racks and storerooms.

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

In the previous article, “The principles of RFID: Hardware Basics,” we discussed the key hardware components found in most RFID solutions. This article will focus on the active tag, an RFID tag that has an onboard power source. This power source is, in most cases, a coin cell battery that can be found in many different types of electronic gadgets. The battery extends the functionality of the RFID tag so that it can be used in a multitude of new applications due to the boost in transmission power and the ability to integrate and power circuitry in the tag beyond that in a passive tag.

With well more than half of all autographed items likely fake, memorabilia dealers are turning to technology for help

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

The business of sports has grown rapidly worldwide. According to the most recent report from the Sports Business Journal, the size of the American sports industry has reached an astonishing US$213 billion annually and the global market has been estimated to be close to a trillion dollar market. One Canadian media analyst has labeled our passion for sports as our new societal obsession, which he terms “sporno” (the idea that athletes and sport are the new pornography).

By Jerry Banks and Les G. Thompson, co-authors of RFID Applied

The most basic radio frequency identification solution is made up of three main hardware components. These components are the RFID tag, the RFID reader, and the antenna. This is, of course, an over simplification of what it takes to apply today’s RFID technology to a real world problem, but these are the fundamental building blocks. Understanding the fundamentals of RFID is the key that allows practitioners to be successful in their application of the technology. Even though this article does not discuss the software required to interpret and make use of the RFID data, its role in a complete RFID solution is vital.

The race is on to see if this hot new technology will be an alternative, or a complement, to RFID

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

What if there was a technology that one-upped RFID? What if there was a way to have continuous identification, but without the extreme size, cost, and limited life of active RFID? What if there was a way to gain far greater read ranges? What if there was a way to overcome the problems of reading around water and metal that have been the operational “Achilles’ heels” of item-level RFID? That possibility exists today in the form of RuBee. Already heralded by industry observers as “RFID 2.0,” RuBee may be the most exciting development in the automatic identification marketplace. This article is a primer on RuBee and its potential prominent place in the auto-ID market.

Rapid progress of early-adopting retailers is stretching their headstart beyond the often cited six-month comfort zone

By David Wyld, Contributing Editor

In Line56 Magazine, Tamina Vahidy recently observed that the Wal-Mart mandate has already effectively “changed the face of retail ... making what had been a niche technology into a mainstream application.” Since 2004, Wal-Mart’s commitment to the technology has certainly been a driving force for the entire RFID market. And the well-reported work of the University of Arkansas’ RFID Research Center has shown the demonstrable impact of RFID at improving the mammoth retailer’s supply chain visibility and execution, dramatically reducing out-of-stocks, cutting back unnecessary orders, and improving the effectiveness of promotional efforts.

Recently, Wal-Mart’s CIO Rollin Ford pronounced that: “We continue to work with suppliers to help them see the vast potential of RFID. We’re already fully convinced of its value and are ready to step up the pace since we know we are only touching the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the benefits of this technology ... We are actively engaged in designing some new initiatives that will accelerate our program even further and, in so doing, create even more value for everyone involved.”

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

On the same day the “enterprise mobility” company announced its looming acquisition by handset manufacturer Motorola, manufacturer Symbol Technologies rolled out a new RFID reader for harsh, rugged environments.

New generation of games use ID technologies to bridge gap to virtual environments

By Nate Ahearn, Contributing Editor

The days of gaming were once spent with crowded rooms of onlookers peering into a fluorescent screen being brought to life by millions of electrons firing down a tube. Over recent years the technology behind the playing field of video games has changed as smaller, thinner, and more visually defined displays emerged. But just as high-definition television sets have now started to work their way into the mainstream, a new way to experience video games has started, ever so slightly, to fall into the gaze of the tech savvy public. It’s a way to play games that takes human interaction beyond pressing buttons or waving controllers at a screen, instead relying on direct human movements and locations to act as inputs. And identification technologies – barcodes, RFID, and smart cards -- are making it possible.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

You can tag cows, you can tag drugs, and you can tag palates. So long as you have picked a good reader, you’re all set, right? Not true, unless you’ve selected the ideal frequency for your particular application. For developers in the RFID space, differences between UHF, HF, and other “F” variations are clear as day. But for the rest of us, the various manifestations, applications, even the very concept of ‘frequency’ can leave us scratching our head. In RFID schemes, a product’s radio frequency (the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum that electromagnetic waves can be generated within) falls into set band constraints – each with its own limitations and benefits.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFID Operations.

GOSHEN, Ind.—Think it’ll take a six-figure loan for you or the small businesses you work with to start using radio frequency identification technology?

You won’t if you follow the example set by Rollpak Corp. The mom-and-pop manufacturer of industrial trash can liners, which employs only 80 workers, and only three dedicated IT staffers, did it for only $5,900. Furthermore, installing the RFID system took fewer than 40 hours of dedicated work.

Massive data sharing presents the biggest threat

By Anne Zieger, Contributor, RFID Operations

This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFID Operations.

Over the last few months, some high-profile hacks have brought attention to the security problems individual RFID tags face.
In one recent case, a hacker changed data found in retail smart labels, using only a PDA-based reader and home-brewed software. In another, researchers compromised tags used for millions of car immobilizers and Smart Tag toll systems.

Wal-mart’s ‘next 300’ proving to be an educated bunch

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

Gone are the RFID conventions dominated by basic questions like “What is Middleware?” Companies on-ready to deploy RFID technology are more familiar with fundamental issues and terms related to supply chain implementations. Whether for government or mass-market retailer mandates, the excitement surrounding the technology itself is a testament to RFID’s growth in the United States and internationally. So as implementation moves beyond the initial 300 Wal-mart suppliers that have generated so much RFID buzz, it is clear that others have learned from these voluntary, and not-so-voluntary, pioneers.

New technology facilitates self-checkout for patrons, automated re-shelving for personnel

By Andy Williams, Contributing Editor

If you haven’t been to a public library lately you might be surprised what you find. You might find you can check out your own books and DVDs without the aid of a clerk. You might find a librarian quickly scanning a shelf of books to determine which have been misfiled or are missing. You might find that you can return your books at an off-site drop box and get immediate credit for having returned them. No more rushing to the library itself to avoid overdue penalties. This and more is already available to many library patrons courtesy of RFID.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

The Chinese say it’s The Year of The Dog, but in the market for the best Gen 2 RFID products, it’s also the year for a doggone number of new choices.

Numerous vendors are hyping their latest RFID chips, readers, tags, printers and software, leaving buyers with an apparent wealth of options. But with every vendor peddling its Gen 2-compliant products as superior, buyers are left in a sea of confusion.

Retailers, vendors taking systems integrators seriously to move beyond mass-market RFID mandates

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

To date, the RFID requirements issued by a handful of mass-market retailers’ have been met primarily via ‘slap and ship,’ smacking a tag on a box and calling it ‘RFID Compliant.’ But thanks to the release of the EPC/Global Gen 2 RFID standard and increasing availability of interoperable RFID components, that’s starting to change.

By Marcus Smith, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

(This article originally ran in 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio—At the minimum security Ross Correctional Facility in Chillicothe, Ohio, prisoners are fitted with active UHF wristbands so they can not only tell guards where they are at any given moment, but where they have been.

TSI PRISM division of Alanco Technologies Inc., is in the middle of a $415,000 pilot project for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation & Corrections at Ross, with the potential of introducing the tracking system at 33 ODRC facilities housing 44,000 prisoners, says Greg Oester, president of the division.

(This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

By Gene J. Koprowski, RFIDOperations

Faced with the prospect of millions of silicon-based RFID tags dumped in landfills, researchers are trying to create an environmentally-friendly tag. NCR Corp. researchers are now producing passive RFID tags inlaid on a roll of paper. They are experimenting with what kinds of conductive inks work best in printed RFID labels; what is the best process to manufacture them and what adhesives are best. But they are also paying close attention to whether organic chips can be a breakthrough technology.

Golf balls, race cars, runners, pigeons all tagged in the name of the game

By David C. Wyld, Contributing Editor

The wide world of sports is no doubt one of the sexiest applications for RFID on the horizon, and innovative companies across the globe are rushing into sports applications for the technology. We are seeing that the games and races themselves can be enhanced through the use of RFID technology and we are seeing that RFID can be used to create new metrics – as well as new gambling opportunities – in the sports world.

Meet the man who will decide if you are Gen 2 compliant

(This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

WHETHER YOU ARE selling or buying Gen 2 products, the readers and tags under development are about to be put to the test. RFID Operations decided to speak to the man in charge of the testing, Gaylon Morris, director of RFID programs for Met Laboratories, a company in the testing field since 1959 that was selected by EPC Global to handle this program.

Morris, 32, has been with Met Labs for almost six years, working on electrical product safety and NEBS testing. Editor Andy Kowl spoke with Morris about the plans for certifying the newest generation of RFID technology.

By Rhea Wessel, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations.

A pen that was first used on Apollo 7 in 1969 and made famous again 3 decades later on the Seinfeld sitcom because it could write upside down, is now able to do much more.

Fisher Space Pen of the U.S. and Dutch pen designer, Allwrite BV, have developed an RFID-based Hi-Pen so users can walk through electronically controlled doors and gates, operate restricted computers or get snacks out of an enabled vending machine. The pen could be used as a marketing tool for companies attending trade fairs or any company wanting a long-lasting novelty advertisement. At about $50, the Hi-Pen combines RFID tag technology with the writing performance of the Fisher Space Pen, which writes upside down, in space, underwater and at the top of Mount Everest.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations.

INDIANAPOLIS—The arrival of spring brings warmer weather and, in many states, the beginning of another season for amusement parks and carnivals. Until now, the latter has also meant a roller coaster of paperwork for state safety inspectors.

Nationally, about 3,000 people are injured on mobile amusement park rides, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. But the most tragic and widely publicized incidents (fewer than five die every year) are leading to new regulations that hold states accountable. This February, a bill calling for stricter safety inspections—“Greyson’s Law”—was introduced in Ohio. The bill is named after eight-year-old Greyson Yoe, who died last year, a month after he was shocked from an improperly grounded bumper-car ride.

What makes an RFID product “revolutionary,” and not just a victim of their PR flak’s lack of creativity for choosing one of the most overused buzzwords?

Supposedly, RedPrairie’s latest a suite of solutions that enable companies to directly respond to consumer demand is “revolutionizing” the supply chain.

We’re talking about RedPrairie’s new “end-to-end (E2eTM) solutions that enable companies to deliver and compete in today’s complex, fast-paced, consumer-driven environment.”
RedPrairie Company Leader John Jazwiec unveiled the company’s new brand during his presentation to a large audience of logistics industry leaders.
“E2e is RedPrairie’s answer to the consumer-driven supply chain challenges our customers face,” Jazwiec said. “Every industry is being challenged with increasingly complex multi-channel demands, especially from the end consumer of their products. The ability to respond to create perfect, customized, and timely orders is a critical competitive advantage to meet consumer expectations, reduce inventory and storage costs, and streamline operations.”
Want to judge the revolution for yourself? See the full release (below)

RFID system. Check. Technical know-how. Check. Implementation strategy. Check.

Managing data? Not so much.

Here’s an idea: ABI Research just announced the launch of a new database as part of its RFID Research Service. The RFID Tag IC Market Sizing Database provides aggregated shipment data reported by leading RFID IC manufacturers worldwide. The database, which is updated quarterly and may be searched by subscribers to the Service, segments these shipments by quarter, by frequency, and by standard.

Or, as Erik Michielsen, Director of ABI Research's RFID and M2M research practice, puts it: "It provides a fundamental understanding of where the market stands today, and gives us a better understanding of supply and demand dynamics as we forecast the market over the next three to five years."

By David C. Wyld, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publishing

Jan Carlzon, the former President of Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), wrote a best-selling business book in 1986, titled Moments of Truth. Carlzon defined the “moment of truth” in any service business as, “anytime a customer comes into contact with any aspect of a business, however remote, (it) is an opportunity to form an impression.” Carlzon emphasized the importance of managing all the small details of the entire airline experience for passengers, in order to generate superior customer satisfaction and loyalty. From this simple “moment of truth” concept, Jan Carlzon took SAS -- an airline that was failing at the time -- and quickly turned it around to become one of the world’s premier airlines.

(This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

By Rhea Wessel, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

COLOGNE, Germany—The world’s most popular sporting event will be RFID-enabled. The 2006 World Cup soccer tournament will feature RFID-based electronic admission tickets at the games’ 12 German venues.

World Cup organizers announced last year that they wanted to install the admission control system by the end of 2004. It’s not in place yet, so while the initiative appears to be behind schedule, at least one of the 12 stadiums in the tournament—Cologne’s 1. FC Köln Rhein Energie Stadion—has taken matters into its own hands to be ready for the start of play.

ROI projected in 12 months

(This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

By Larry Moffi, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

MINONG, Wis.—When Jack Link’s Snack Foods chose to meet Wal-Mart’s RFID compliance deadline, it did so within 60 days of beginning the project, at a cost of just $48,000 and by adapting its financial management software, Microsoft Business Solutions’ Navision, to accommodate its unique RFID demands.

(This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

By Ronald E. Quirk Jr., Esq., Venable LLP, Washington,
www.venable.com.

WASHINGTON—The Federal Trade Commission says laws are already in place to protect consumer privacy and is urging the RFID industry to police itself.

In a recently released report, RFID: Applications and Implications for Consumers, the FTC says it will take a hands-off approach to RFID for now, and encouraged the RFID industry to self-regulate. The day after the report was released, a Senate Republican High Tech Task Force announced it will “protect exciting new technologies,” including RFID, from “premature regulation or legislation in search of a problem.” The Task Force, made up of 14 Republican senators and chaired by John Ensign (R-Nev.), issued a statement assuring the industry that RFID will be free of unnecessary federal regulations.

By Rhea Wessel

Joe Banker rides this city’s subway every morning from his apartment outside of the city to his office high rise. Each month, he pays roughly €100 ($128) for his transport ticket. This month, however, he was sent to London on short notice for two weeks. Banker has grossly overpaid for riding the rails.

If Joe had an electronic ticket that calculated fares only for the rides he took, he would have about €50 more to spend on a London theater ticket. Creating a more user-friendly and profitable local transit system is one of the goals of a recent project sponsored by the German Mass Transit Association, the Verband Deutscher Verkehrsunternehmen (VDV) with the support of the federal government.

By Andy Williams, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publications

A company specializing in contactless cards and readers and a university that's synonymous with technology advances are meeting the privacy and security fears surrounding RFID head-on.

HID Corp. started with a forum last December on RFID legislation pending in California then joined up with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to create a public forum to discuss RFID and public policy. Additionally they will jointly explore new uses of RFID for personal identification that can enhance privacy and security. They also will be producing a web site to inform industry, government, and the general public about RFID.

Tackling a 600 fpm conveyor at 10 feet per second, you better have a plan

The situation:

Armed with one RFID reader and four antennas, we had to figure out how to get a 100% read rate on tagged items as they moved along a conveyor.

At first it seemed that the typical ‘box’ design would be a great idea. The fact is, however, placing four antennas over a read area is usually the worst possible design for nearly any RFID installation.

Back-room alliances, sleepless nights and billions at stake

(This article originally ran in the May 2005 issue of RFIDOperations)

By Dann Anthony Maurno, Contributing Editor RFIDOperations

Until Sept. 10, 2003, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology had been nurturing the technology called Radio Frequency Identification. MIT’s Auto ID Center was a coalition of nearly 100 companies and five research universities, a sort of “Continental Congress” that included Wal-Mart, Gillette, and RFID technology suppliers. On this September day however, at an Auto ID Extraordinary General Assembly meeting in Brussels, Belgium, the impending handoff to a new organization was announced to its key members. EPC Global was born officially, on October 31 (2003) and the six Auto ID Centers were renamed Auto-ID Laboratories. RFID was going “prime time.”

By Rhea Wessel, Contributing Editor, RFID Operations

LONDON—A recent study in the U.K. shows counterfeited or recalled medicine can be identified at the point of dispensing by pharmacists using RFID, which should increase patient safety and help pharmaceutical companies protect their brands.

During the study, pharmacists were also alerted within minutes about a drug recall. A pain-killer produced by Merck & Co. called Vioxx was recalled, and Aegate, which ran the computers that supported the scanning system, posted the drug recall notice live on its systems within three minutes.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publishing

Whether it’s the rising cost of prescription drugs or more sophisticated technology and funding for counterfeiters, incidents of drug counterfeiting have skyrocketed in the United States. Drug counterfeiting now costs the Food and Drug Administrations more than $30 billion annually, a number so great that the agency is embracing new technology that will help it give teeth to a law that requires the pharmaceutical industry to closely track a drug’s “pedigree.” That’s the term applied to a drug’s record documenting that it was manufactured and distributed under secure conditions.

By David C. Wyld, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publications

Robert Malone, Editor of Inbound Logistics magazine, recently commented that, “it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to discover that pharmaceuticals are a prime candidate for the use of RFID in our new era of high security.”

In recent months, there have been significant developments in the pharmaceutical marketspace, as both Pfizer and Purdue Pharma have announced significant RFID-labeling programs for two of their most sought after – both legally and illegally – drug products. Pfizer has announced that by the end of the first quarter of 2006, all shipments of Viagra, the lifestyle drug for erectile dysfunction, will carry RFID tags. Likewise, the privately-held Purdue Pharma has green-lighted a significant pilot program to apply smart labels to all shipments of OxyContin, a narcotic pain-killer.

Fans and Foes of SB 768 still trying to work on a compromise in latest version

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

The California RFID bill hailed by privacy advocates but feared by the tech industry is undergoing major revisions as both sides try to work out differences before the end of the legislative session in August, when the bill would expire.

In this first-ever installment of the RFIDNews Gen2 Corner, we investigate the benefits Gen 2 offers over its predecessor. In the future, this recurring corner will delve into features and concepts such as Q-Algorithm, Persistence, and Dense Reader Mode as well as applications, products, and more. Stay tuned...

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor

Like many technologies, the promise of RFID seemed to be more pipe dream than reality. For years, challenges such as frequent interference and missed reads happened so often that the technology destined to follow barcodes hadn’t measured up to the hype. But in 2006 that’s going to change, say both industry experts and manufacturers of RFID products.

Near Field Communications, a technology originally developed by Philips and Sony, is starting to pick up speed thanks to last year's creation of the NFC Forum. Its membership is growing, as is the technology that spawned it, but NFC is still in its infancy with only a smattering of projects to look at.

The NFC Forum was created last year by Nokia Corporation, Royal Philips Electronics, and Sony Corporation to promote the NFC technology or, as the release announcing the forum's inception, said: "To enable the use of touch-based interactions in consumer electronics, mobile devices, PCs, smart objects and for payment purposes.. The new forum will promote implementation and standardization of NFC technology to ensure interoperability between devices and services. The vision of the NFC Forum is to enable users to access content and services in an intuitive way."

A search for technology that would enable users to find their lost hearing aids piqued a University of Pittsburgh professor's interest in RFID, but the beneficiaries are not hearing aid customers, but small businesses.

He's still looking for the hearing aid solution, but in the meantime, small businesses, which normally couldn't afford RFID research and development, could very well benefit from Dr. Marlin Mickle's sojourn into the RFID world. His team at the University of Pittsburgh recently announced the success of a joint development effort with ADCUS, Inc., the U.S. based subsidiary of South Korea's ADChips, to produce customized active RFID tags. This project will enable companies to be able to afford customized RFID tags, he said.

A Massachusetts company has created an active RFID product for hospitals that can track patients and equipment. Bypassing normal RFID uses, Radianse, Inc. is into its second year of production, averaging about one new hospital a month. As its founder and chief technology officer, Mike Dempsey, says: “We don’t do supply chain, we don’t do security. Our goal is to make hospitals safer and more efficient.”

What's the cause of the biggest argument at organized sports games? It's certainly not the fan next to you or even the opposing team. It's the judgment calls of the game's referees. Instant replay has tried to solve some of those disputes, but you're still relying on camera angles and line of sight. Enter an even more high-tech system: the RFID-enabled smartball from Adidas.

"Was that a goal?" is a question the smartball was meant to decide. To see if it works, the International Football Association Board, the ruling arm of international football, debated at its February meeting whether technology could help match officials make quick decisions in unclear situations, such as whether a goal has been scored or not.

Allan Griebenow is the President and CEO of AXCESS International.

Your company's decision to license Java was covered by a number of news sources as Sun's entry into active RFID. Is this the case?

We have been working with the people at the Sun RFID Innovations Center for some time prior to this release regarding active RFID technology. In an effort to offer their customers a more diverse range of solutions, Sun asked us to define our approach on several RFID applications where passive technology did not really fit the bill. Our common interests evolved from there, culminating in our decision to work more closely with Sun as a business partner.

Ross Stapleton-Gray is Stapleton-Gray & Associates' principal analyst and the founder of the Sorting Door Project.

What are the goals of the Sorting Door Project?

It is intended to examine RFID, surveillance and privacy issues. In a nutshell, while the read ranges of passive RFID tags are fairly short, they might be readily scanned in constrained spaces, like doorways; doorways are also natural places to want to monitor individuals, e.g., to welcome a friend (or valued customer), or bar access to a threat. The project proposes to link numerous and independent Sorting Doors (the name derives from the Sorting Hat, of the Harry Potter series, which could mystically look into the character of the wizardry student on whose head it was placed) to back end resources used to aggregate and analyze RFID-derived data, and to make inferences about the nature of those passing through the Doors.

Alan Melling is the Senior Director of EPC Solutions at Symbol Technologies.

Symbol hopes to continue to solidify its position in the RFID market. In what areas does the company look to expand its presence?

Symbol wants to expand its RFID presence in the supply chain and government markets with readers that are easy to install and capable of performing advanced applications. Symbol continues to invest aggressively such products that enable wide scale deployment of RFID—much in the same that way we have invested in other critical technologies, such as the wireless standard 802.11. Some real-world examples of our efforts to help make RFID adoption easier and more efficient for customers include the DC600, which is our second generation dock door portal. This portal reduces installation time for an RFID reader from more than two hours to less than 30 minutes. Similarly, Symbol recently announced a new RFID reader - the XR400 - which was the first fixed reader based on the Windows CE operating system, and was designed to ease integration with a company’s overall IT infrastructure. Symbol is all about making RFID work at a large, commercial scale.

David C. Wyld is the Mayfield Professor of Management and the Director of the Strategic e-Commerce Initiative at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond, Louisiana.

The word from the plains of Texas is not good. Earlier this month, investigators confirmed that the U.S. has suffered its second case in three years of “Mad Cow” disease (also known as Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy – BSE).

When the U.S. experienced its first case of the so-called “mad cow disease” in December 2003, billions of dollars were lost as both Americans at their dinner tables and buyers for restaurants and grocery stores, both at home and abroad, decided that U.S. beef would not be “what’s for dinner.” While Mad Cow inspires fear in the hearts of every non-vegan, it is especially worrisome for the American beef industry, which employs 1.5 million people and generates $68 billion a year in sales from the approximately 100 million head of cattle in the United States.

One of the biggest challenges facing the RFID supply chain is choosing the right type of tag and then deciding where it should be placed on the product's packaging. Incorrectly placed tags can lead to poor reading results and could mean failure to meet mandated compliance standards.

This is where CAPE Systems, with its tag locator software, hopes to make a difference. The New Jersey-based company is a provider of software technology for packaging design, RFID asset tracking, pallet optimization, inventory and warehouse management, supply chain execution and order fulfillment. Last month, it introduced its RFID Tag Locator software designed for RFID tag placement analysis and pallet-reading optimization.

Taking it step-by-step means small upfront cost at St. Louis facility

By Victoria Forlini

Dipping RFID tags in liquid nitrogen may not be standard operating procedure for most projects, but Boeing IDS believes a sub-zero experiment may help reduce spoilage and track containers in their plant here.

The following is an excerpt of RFID: Applications, Security, and Privacy. This chapter is written by EPC pioneer Sanjay Sarma¹.

Although the concept of radio frequency identification (RFID) is not new, the term RFID has been in use for only a couple of decades.² In the 1980s and 1990s, long after the early use of RFID during World War II, innovations in RF circuitry enabled passive RFID tags (tags without batteries, which scavenge power from the reader's field) to provide enough range to become viable. Today, RFID tags are seemingly everywhere: in toll passes, card-keys, automobile keys, payment systems (like the Mobil Speedpass system), and animal identification.

What has changed is the emergence of the Electronic Product Code (EPC) system, which is a suite of standards and technologies that weaves basic RFID into a standardized scheme for keeping track of material in the supply chain. The EPC was created at MIT by a few researchers involved in a research project called the Distributed Intelligent Systems Center (DISC). Later, this research effort morphed to fulfill a growing need in the retail supply chain and became the Auto-ID Center. This chapter presents a brief history of the Auto-ID Center, talking mostly about the technology, the industry, and the adoption of the EPC system.

My own first, forgettable, brush with RFID occurred in the early 1990s when I was a graduate student at Berkeley. At that time, I was interested in identifying and locating work-pieces for manufacturing automation. I had looked at RFID as a possible positioning device in automation and rejected it as being far too imprecise and expensive. Little did I realize then that our paths would cross again!

Doug Ahlers is the Vice President of Operations for the InCom Corporation.

Brittan Elementary School called InClass's® wearable RFID tags "safety badges." Does this accurately describe the purpose of the system?

No — but it does describe one of the many values the system has to offer. The InClass® system is an automated electronic attendance taking system designed to improve attendance taking and reporting accuracy, while saving teacher and administrator time. InCom’s proprietary RFID badge holders have a pocket where the school can insert the student’s identification card. The school supplies the card. Brittan Elementary School, a K-8 grade school, planned on having students wear identification cards for security reasons. The principal saw InClass® as another benefit which he could implement at the same time.

Precision Dynamics is using passive RFID wristbands to track jailhouse prisoners. Right now, the company is in local jails, but state prisons are next.

"We currently have three facilities (jails) up and running," said Tom Foster, RFID patron management specialist for Precision Dynamics. "We also have a dozen water parks up and running so you don't have to carry a wallet," he said of the company's RFID Clincher wristband.

Because Clincher uses passive RFID tags, the cost per inmate at county jails is extremely low, about $1.50 to $2, said Victor LaRosa, PDC's age/ID manager for patron management. "Our cost to entry is a lot less than if you were using active tags."

"Correction officers are strapped to the hilt and governments don't have a half million dollars to implement this," added Mr. Foster of active RFID technology. "We can get them up and running for $10.000." He believes that using active RFID technology to track prisoners "is overkill."

A California produce company which has delivered tree fruit and grapes to grocery store shelves for more than 50 years tapped RFID technology as one of its 21st century moves to increase its order accuracy while getting a better handle on inventory. The result will be a better quality product for its retail and wholesale customers.

Established in 1943 as a partnership between a grower, a marketer, and a wholesaler, Ballantine Produce is headquartered in Reedley, Calif. in the San Joaquin Valley, the state's top agricultural producing region.

Dr. Peter Harrop PhD, FIEE, FCIM is Chairman of IDTechEx Ltd. He has consulted for organizations such as Kodak, GEC, the Manchester Airport, and Diageo. He lectures and consults internationally on low cost RFID.

RFID helps prevent wrong-site surgery and other medical mishaps

By Marisa Torrieri

A patient needs a new knee. A nurse marks a big “X” on his right knee.

Think “X” marks the spot?

Sometimes surgeons don’t and they operate on the wrong knee.
At best, wrong-site surgeries like these turn into a multi million-dollar lawsuit. At worst, they are fatal. Thanks to RFID technology, such scenarios are avoidable.

By Dann Anthony Maurno

Intermec Technologies Corp. is offering its version of a summer sale on its patent portfolio; and, yes, it’s only available until just before Labor Day.

The company announced on May 4 its Rapid Start Licensing Program, which provides RFID manufacturers access to Intermec’s 140+ portfolio of RFID patents at reduced rates. That program begins June 1, 2005, and concludes Aug. 31. According to Intermec, this will provide the marketplace with clear guidance about which vendors are licensed to use Intermec’s RFID intellectual property and will simplify complicated technology cross-licensing issues. Intermec’s announcement sparked excitement in the investor community, with Intermec parent company Unova’s stock leaping from $17 at closing May 4, to $19.88 on May 5.

Wanted: innovators who anticipate the complexity of future RFID networks

By Steve Smith

You know that line chart projecting billions of revenue for the RFID market by 2008? Leave it out of your next pitch to venture capitalists.

“Everybody’s got the hockey stick chart,” says Aaron Cheatham, principal at Mobius Venture Capital.
Claiming that your company will ride the same wave of RFID revenue as everyone else is among the most common mistakes RFID startups make when trying to woo VCs. And too many companies regurgitate the same IDC tech research when they cultivate investors.

Pitches like that tell VCs that you have no unique market insights to share. Half of being a VC is determining where general industry knowledge is wrong, says Cheatham.

Privacy concerns continued to dominate the legislative RFID landscape at the state level. So far, those who want to limit access to personal information seem to be prevailing.

Actions taken on three of four bills related to privacy issues sought to limit the scope of RFID. Texas lawmakers killed a plan to use RFID tags to nab people who weren’t paying enough car insurance. A school privacy bill to prevent school districts from forcing students to wear RFID tags in the Lone Star State moved one step closer to passage. A lawmaker in California introduced a bill that would ban the use of RFID in local and state government-issued identification documents to prevent identity theft and stalking.

To spur adoption of RFID (radio frequency identification), a powerful new supply chain technology, and to simplify licensing of its RFID intellectual property portfolio, RFID pioneer Intermec Technologies Corp. today announced a limited-time Rapid Start Licensing Program that provides RFID manufacturers access to Intermec’s broad portfolio of RFID innovation at attractive rates. The program, which begins June 1, 2005, and concludes Aug. 31, 2005, will provide the marketplace with clear guidance about which vendors are licensed to use Intermec’s RFID IP and will simplify complicated technology cross-licensing issues.

Manhattan Associates has released an improved version of its EPC Manager which Greg Gilbert, director of RFID Solutions, says will enhance a company's "work flow and translation activities to better enable the integration of EPC technology into existing business applications."

The company announced its new EPC Manager, now in its third version, in early April and says it will help its customers boost accuracy, ensure compliance with regulatory requirements and experience greater visibility and improved security within their supply chains through the use of RFID functionality. Enhancements in this updated version were based on the latest RFID technology and evolving industry needs, added Mr. Gilbert.

I.D. Systems, in collaboration with Symbol Technologies, is shooting to produce a prototype wireless tracking system for airport cargo and baggage handling. The Transportation Security Administration contract is aimed at tracking the vehicles that handle the cargo.

"TSA has basically collaborated with I.D. Systems and Symbol to integrate what I.D. Systems does, which is wireless vehicle tracking, with what Symbol does, which is cargo tracking," said Ken Ehrman, I.D. Systems' president.

He couldn't divulge the amount of the contract because of TSA requirements, he said. While development of the system has started, Mr. Ehrman said he didn't know when, or where, the prototype would be installed.

Ron Rose is the CEO of i-Konect.

A singularity is the moment at which technical progress will accelerate at a rate beyond our comprehension. What does the name mean in the context of your product?

We felt the name Singularity reflects our vision of the product's potential impact on the industry. More simply put, we look for Singularity to accelerate the adoption of RFID enabled solutions beyond our comprehension of its use today.

Dennis Gaughan is a Research Director at AMR Research.

You remarked at the RFID Journal Live conference that the industry was in need of "evidence of a compelling business benefit for cross-enterprise RFID" and that "the content of the presentations is in dire need of a refresh." Is the industry not moving fast enough or just not moving?

That depends on what part of the industry you are looking at. We do see some examples of benefits, but mostly for targeted, closed loop internal deployments. And it is nothing that people are willing to share publicly. It's the cross-industry RFID that is not moving. Some of the response to my alert felt I should have gone further with my comments. One company lamented that I didn't name the article "the RFID world is stuck reverse — Time for someone to turn off the motor"

Readers must be able to scan 100 tags per second

By Dennis Sullivan

The pool of vendors doing business with the military just got larger with some of the biggest names in the RFID industry trying to capture a share of the estimated $200 million government contracting market.

Last month, nine companies won approval from the U.S. Army Contracting Agency and were awarded Blanket Purchase Agreements to sell to the military RFID Class 0 and Class 1 fixed and transportable readers that can also be upgraded to comply with the Gen 2 standards. It’s the second of five groups of RFID sales awards. The first awards group only won approval to sell 96-bit Class 1 passive tags. The three other awards groups, which have not been announced yet, include sales of 96-bit Class 1 printers, engineering services and Class 0 and Class hand-held readers. The other group announcements are expected soon.

But DoD’s original January 1 deadline came and went. What’s happening?

By Peter A. Buxbaum

Showing how important the Department of Defense considers its RFID initiative, already 97% of the supply pallets currently sent to forces in Iraq are being shipped with RFID tags.
As for the rest of the mandate, getting the DoD’s RFID program up and running is reminiscent one of the clichés of military life. “Hurry up and wait.”
Last year, DoD announced it was deadly serious about making a Jan. 1, 2005, RFID mandate real. That deadline has come and gone and contractors are still waiting for the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation clauses that detail RFID tagging requirements for new contracts.

EPC Global disagrees; ‘Bloody mess,’ says vendor

By Dann Anthony Maurno

At first, it seemed as if the new UHF Generation 2 standards the industry had been waiting for would finally allow companies to begin making equipment so any tag could be used with any reader anywhere in the world.

EPC Global Inc. even proclaimed Gen 2 the first global royalty-free standard.
This bit of news probably came as a shock to officials at Intermec Technologies Corp. They claimed since August that they wanted royalty payments from some patents they hold they say are needed to build chips, tags and readers that meet the Gen 2 specs. Without Intermec’s patents, an RFID system would be so stripped down, it would be unworkable, officials claim.

EPC Global officials, who had promised to deliver a royalty-free standard by end of 2004, determined Intermec’s intellectual property is not essential and only the royalty-free IP is needed to meet the standard. Last month, Intermec, which had been one of the early pioneers in developing the RFID standards with EPC Global, responded by withdrawing its payment plan—a move some say has put a freeze on the RFID market.

A monthly look at government activity at the state and federal levels

By Ronald E. Quirk Jr., Esq., Venable LLP

During the past month, RFID regulatory trends appear to have shifted. In previous months, the states and the federal government worked to introduce bills aimed at requiring retailers to protect consumer privacy. Now, some states are focusing on restricting the use of RFID by public schools, while others have specifically exempted RFID from a new computer privacy law, and killed a pending RFID retail consumer privacy bill.

Maintenance and paperwork reductions add to benefits

By Marisa Torrieri

When the fleet you manage runs on an indoor landscape spanning 220 acres, it’s hard to keep track of who’s running what equipment. And if you have contractors from other companies working on the weekends, you might have no way of guaranteeing they have the OSHA-approved training required to operate your vehicles.

These were burning concerns two years ago at Toyota Motor Manufacturing in Georgetown, Ky., says Rick Noe, the group leader in forklift maintenance of the plant that builds the Camry and other models. Should these drivers get into a serious accident, Toyota could be slapped with an OSHA citation or worse, Noe says, adding that it was not unusual to see the entire carriage torn off a forklift, and have no idea who was responsible.

Trailblazing retail giant decides to keep rolling out after successful world-famous pilot program

By Stephen Barlas

With the Gen 2 standard all but a reality, Metro Group, the large German retailer, is getting ready to push its pilot RFID program to a second stage. Since November, 20 consumer goods vendors have been tagging pallets destined for 20 stores with a Phillips Electronics “hybrid” chip that straddles U.S. and European standards. The chips have been incorporated into inlays attached to pallets going to a few mammoth distribution centers such as its facility in Unna, as well as its Metro Cash & Carry and its Real and Kaufhof divisions.

Awards could mean $200 million in contracts

By Peter A. Buxbaum

WASHINGTON D.C.—Five vendors won approval to supply the U.S. military with passive tags as part of a larger program that could be worth $200 million in government contracts over the next several years. This is the first of five groups of RFID sales awards.

By Andy Kowl, Editor RFID Operations

When Wal-Mart announced on Jan. 11 at ProMat in Chicago that 57 suppliers were then shipping RFID-tagged cases and pallets, eyebrows were raised. The retailer has been under increasing scrutiny by the growing RFID industry and the business press, with rumors of poor compliance, low read-rates and broken machines.

Wal-Mart considers the first two months of RFID deployment a success; and Simon Langford, its manager of global RFID strategy, believes there is much misinformation surrounding one of the most watched technology deployments of this new century. “Everyone thought we told all suppliers they had to be ready Jan. 1,” Langford mused. “Nobody could do that—it’s a holiday!”

Suppliers take a variety of routes to reach the RFID destination

By Gene J. Koprowski

Wal-Mart flexibly managed its 2005 mandate for leading vendors to RFID-enable their containers. The retailer allowed some strategic suppliers to slip past that date, as they worked out an array of compliance problems. By the end of January, the required RFID systems were all in place, and many of these suppliers were collecting data on the delivery of their products with the technology.

Some of the Wal-Mart suppliers opted to go with off-the-shelf RFID systems in order to meet the mandate, purchasing labels, tags, printers and readers that are not fully integrated into back-end information systems.

By Marisa Torrieri, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publications

RFID will help restaurants kick their service up a notch, restaurant industry technology experts said in May, during the National Restaurant Association’s annual convention at McCormick Place convention center in Chicago.

Industry watchers seem confident that demand for better customer service will drive the public’s acceptance of tags when they dine out. As consumers come to expect great customer service, “they’re going to allow us to use things like RFID tags” to obtain demographic and other information, said Bob Murphy, Chili’s restaurants vice president of systems and technology, during a panel on the restaurant of 2010.

By Victoria Forlini, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

Sometimes, being second means actually being first. Being a second tier Wal-Mart supplier means there has been time to watch the first group and learn from the 2005 compliance deadline while preparing for the January 2006 deadline.

The result, says Patrick Sweeney, the president and CEO of ODIN Technologies, an RFID consulting and implementation firm, is a “better-educated customer.” The firm has worked with first-tier Wal-Mart suppliers, as well as the current group of companies preparing for RFID implementation. Many of the same companies are also grappling with this month’s Target compliance deadline.

By Will Smith, Contributing Editor, RFIPOperations

The average time spent searching for files in Georgia’s DeKalb County Juvenile Court is estimated at 10 hours a week. It is this enormously inefficient and expensive process that the court hopes to avoid by installing an RFID system to tag, track and better organize its 12,000-file mess. The system carries with it a cost of $50,000, an intimidating sum at first glance. But when considered alongside the $30,000 in annual savings the system is projected to generate, the return-on-investment comes within a very impressive 24 months.

Most of the system’s hardware and software will come from 3M, while Texas Instruments will supply the passive RFID transponders used to tag the files. Key features include file check-in and check-out, PC-based file searching and integration with the court’s existing case management software.

By Stephen Barlas, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

Warren Buffett is reputed to be one of the smartest investors in the United States. So maybe it’s no surprise that Shaw Industries, America’s leading carpet manufacturer and a subsidiary of Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., is the first company in its industry to invest in RFID technology.

The company started testing RFID housings in the fourth quarter of 2004, according to David Milligan, a systems engineer at Dalton, Ga.-based Shaw. The housings—a heavy-duty composite shell protecting an RFID inlay—are manufactured by a small company called EmbedTech Industries of Raymond, Maine, which says it’s the only company in the United States encapsulating RFID inlays in three-dimensional plastic housings via an injection molding machine.

House considers active tags for Congressmen and staff

By Peter A. Buxbaum, RFIDOperations

WASHINGTON D.C.—The State Department is moving ahead with plans to add RFID chips to American passports.

As the sophistication of intrepid forgers grows, especially in today’s heightened homeland security atmosphere, the RFID-enabled passport program “will ensure that the person carrying the passport is the person to whom the passport was issued,” said Frank Moss, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Passport Services. It will prevent the forging of passports or the insertion of a new photograph in a genuine passport, he added.

Awards could mean $200 million in contracts

By Peter A. Buxbaum, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

WASHINGTON D.C.—Five vendors won approval to supply the U.S. military with passive tags as part of a larger program that could be worth $200 million in government contracts over the next several years. This is the first of five groups of RFID sales awards.

House considers active tags for Congressmen and staff
By Peter A. Buxbaum, Contributing Editor, RFIDOperations

This article originally appeared in a 2005 issue of RFIDOperations.

WASHINGTON D.C.—The State Department is moving ahead with plans to add RFID chips to American passports.

As the sophistication of intrepid forgers grows, especially in today’s heightened homeland security atmosphere, the RFID-enabled passport program “will ensure that the person carrying the passport is the person to whom the passport was issued,” said Frank Moss, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Passport Services. It will prevent the forging of passports or the insertion of a new photograph in a genuine passport, he added.

Jesse Josephson, Vice President of Marketing for PartsBase, has been on the leading edge of technology marketing and implementation for more than seven years.

For decades the aviation, aerospace, and defense industries have struggled to increase the efficiency of their supply chain. To date, the vast majority of proposed solutions have not made a lasting impact; they fail entirely or complicate issues by populating the industry with non-integrated systems. Despite past experience and a general distaste with current mandates, these industries are searching for an "across-the-board" improvement to the systems used to manage, move, and track inventory.

A Calgary, Alberta, Canada company has offered up new technology that will allow smartphones and personal digital assistants to serve as RFID readers/writers. The new card will also offer Near Field Communication (NFC) compatibility. It is, the company claims, the first RFID reader/writer SD (secure digital) card in the industry

According to Wireless Dynamics' March announcement, its SDiD card will allow smartphones and PDAs to double as portable RFID terminals. The card integrates RFID functionality into the existing computing power and connectivity of PDAs and smartphones. RFID tag information can be communicated in real-time through WiFi, CDMA, GSM or Bluetooth connections.

Looking to stem failure rates &emdash; sometimes as high as 50% &emdash; due to mismatched or out of synch RFID tags and readers, a Reston, VA company has developed a benchmark report that can assist end users in determining the right kind of tag and reader for their particular environment.

"One of the things we realized was that there are a lot of marketing claims out there and users had no way to differentiate one from the other," said Bret Kinsella, vice president of operations and marketing for ODIN Technologies. "Every tag manufacturer said they had the best product, but there was no way to test this. It was a lot of trial and error with nothing based on RF science."

John P. Peeters, Ph.D., is the President and Founder of Gentag, Inc.

Could you give a general description of Gentag’s technology?

Gentag’s technology combines reader capabilities for both active and passive sensors on low cost wireless devices like cell phones. The battery of a cell phone can be used to power an active sensor continuously, even when the cell phone is turned off. Gentag’s has patented a “smart” removable cell phone sensor module. An example might be a carbon monoxide sensor that would detect levels of CO in a home, a car or a work environment. If a dangerous level of CO is present, the cell phone wakes up and immediately notifies the owner. If a person is interested in CO detection then that function can be added onto a cell phone equipped with a sensor module slot. In addition to this capability Gentag is working with the wireless industry to integrate RFID readers in cell phones.

Gentag also uses low cost, passive (battery-less) RFID sensors. An application example of our patented technology is a passive RFID temperature “smart” skin patch that can monitor directly the temperature of a child or patient using a cell phone. Such wireless sensors can be produced for $1 as a finished product.

Mike Marsh is the Managing Director of Trolley Scan, developers of the EcoTag® UHF RFID system.
He is cited in patents embedded in numerous RFID products, mining detonators, mine communication, and free space communication.

In a recent newsletter, Trolley Scan suggested that hardware manufacturers are not preparing to meet the demands of retail RFID applications. Is this a result of simple supply-and-demand, or are there more fundamental issues slowing production?

The requirements for RFID systems in the retail environment will be the largest deployment of electronic systems in the history of mankind. The volumes needed are far beyond what we can imagine, with estimated volumes as large as 10¹⁴ (100 million million) transponders per annum. At present the world is producing an estimated 230 million per annum for applications beyond retail, a capacity that has been built up over the past 20 years. This new requirement would require a huge expansion in the current manufacturing capacity.

In response to the feedback we've received from many of our subscribers and partners, we are proud to announce the premier issue of a new print compilation of AVISIAN ID News. Regarding ID will make its debut on March 15 and will offer a compilation of articles from CR80News, SecureIDNews, ContactlessNews and RFIDNews.