Recently in RFID Category

• ViVOpay—products that transform merchant devices into next-gen contactless payment systems
• ViVOnfc—Integration of three of ViVOtech’s software apps (ViVOwallett, ViVOplatform Issuer Server and ViVOplatform Control Server) into a flexible solution that enable scard issuers, telecom operators and service providers to offer mobile contactless services.
• ViVOfob—Contactless cards and fobs designed to generate revenue for providers of credit cards and prepaid loyalty products.
• ViVOplatform—An online, real-time transaction processing system that supports contactless cards or fobs.

• Announcement that the creator of BlackBerry (Mike Lazaridis) has replaced Motorola’s CEO (Ed Zander) as the CTIA keynoter.
• Announcement from TCS that it has been selected as a CTIA Wireless 2007 E-Tech Award finalist.
• Announcements from Pantech and Nokia about their displays at the show.

• Applications of both low-frequency (LF) and high-frequency (HF, 13.56 MHz) RFID are relatively mature.
  
• During 2008, there will be massive applications of ultra high-frequency (UHF) RFID—especially in supply chain management.
  
• RFID’s growth during 2008 will be supported by well-developed standards and technologies.
  
• The three key areas for RFID application development are Beijing, Shanghai, and the Pearl River Delta.
  
• The retail sector—lead by Wal-Mart—is increasingly using RFID to improve supply chain efficiencies.
  
• Two key drivers for RFID’s use in supply chain management are reduced costs and enhanced automation.
  
• HF RFID is used in ID card applications, and UHF RFID is part of the country’s railway systems project.
  
• The Ministry of Science and Technology is planning 20 major RFID programs, for which the government is allocating more than $16 million. One of the largest is China’s second-generation resident identification card program.

• Independence from downstream conversion processes
• Buffer station capable of catering up to 800 mm of completed reel
• Can inspect and embed reading RFID tags from inlay reel into conversion process
• Touch pad enables operator to key in length metrics
• Can be modulated with current label converting systems or operate stand-alone

In a former life, I worked as a librarian. So, an article about the use of radio frequency ID (RFID) chips at Chicago State University’s library, in the January, 2007 issue of Wired Magazine, caught my eye. At this particular library, students have been banned from the stacks, because robots now are installed to quickly retrieve any item that is desired.

Here’s how it works: every item in the library (books, CDs, DVDs) is tagged with an RFID chip. This allows “tall, forklift-style machines that run on tracks” (the robots) to put away and retrieve materials in a three-story-high storage facility.

“The computer knows where everything is and can hustle the correct bin to the circulation desk for checkout,” Wired explained in its report.

I am both fascinated and repulsed by such a system. From the standpoint of librarians, I can see the appeal. No more lost items caused by well-meaning but unhelpful library users who insist on putting books back on the shelf—in the wrong place.

From the standpoint of the library user, however, the invasion of the RFID robots seems a sad turn of events indeed. No more browsing through the shelves of books, looking through each one before making your selection? The loss of browsing, to me, would make a visit to the library very hollow indeed.

Maybe that’s the point, though—no-one has time anymore to visit the library and spend time choosing just the right book. I admit that I rarely indulge in the activity myself anymore. Most of the time, it’s more convenient simply to place whatever items I want on reserve, and stop by the library on my way home from work to pick them up. If my library were equipped with a system like the one in Chicago, I could simply stop by the circulation desk without even pre-ordering books and have five items delivered to me in the span of 2 ½ minutes.

Perhaps I’m dating myself (youngish though I am) with a nostalgia for a simpler time when libraries were a hands-on affair and the endless battle between order and disorder that took place within those walls made any such facility an organic and fascinating place to hang out.

Then again, you have to admit there is a certain ring to “RFID library robots.” Might make a good name for a rock band…

What do you think—are automated retrieval systems a good thing for libraries? Or are we losing something in the process of wanting to do everything faster, better, and more efficiently?

We’d all like to believe that the medical equipment found in hospitals is efficiently managed, so that if we need it, it’s readily available. But apparently, that’s not always the case.

In a new report out today, ABI Research says that, at any given moment, much of the expensive equipment owned by hospitals—everything from low-tech wheelchairs to high-tech machinery—is hard to find because it’s either already being used, or is in storage. The result is that hospitals tend to over-purchase this type of inventory, and then not utilize it efficiently.

Two wireless technologies currently are vying for position to provide hospitals with better systems for managing their equipment inventories, ABI says: WiFi and active RFID (tags with internal power source).

ABI quotes analyst Sara Shah as saying that less than 5 percent of North American health care facilities are equipped with what are known in the industry as real-time locating systems (RTLSs), so the market truly is up for grabs.

The advantage of WiFi-based RTLSs, Shah says, is that most hospitals already have WiFi networks in place, and many medical devices are equipped with WiFi functionality.

“The value proposition is that they can keep their existing infrastructure and add new elements,” Shah said of WiFi-based RTLSs for hospitals, in the report.

She added that WiFi RTLS vendors such as Aeroscout, Ekahau and PanGo market their products based in part on the fact that they’re standards-based and non-proprietary. The downside of WiFi-based systems is that hospitals will need to install additional access points to bring the needed functionality to existing networks.

“On the other hand, RFID vendors such as RF Code and Radianse point to the wide application of RFID for asset tracking, and their longevity in the industry,” ABI says.

It is true that RFID technology has been around for quite a while. The Wikipedia entry for RFID says that “The technology used in RFID has been around since the early 1920s,” and “The United States Department of Defense has successfully used active tags to reduce logistics costs and improve supply chain visibility for more than 15 years.”

But, RFID tags remain controversial because some people believe their ability to efficiently track consumer goods (and, as a result, consumer behavior) poses a threat to privacy.

My first, uneducated prediction based on the ABI report and what I know about RFID and WiFi was that WiFi will win out. Why? Because WiFi seems more ubiquitous than RFID, and RFID is controversial.

But then, I did some quick research and learned that, apparently, some of the vendors ABI mentions seem unsure themselves regarding which technology will catch on for RTLS applications. For example, the introductory blurb on Aeroscout’s Web site indicates that the company’s system uses both WiFi and RFID.

The got me intrigued, so I took a quick look at the other vendors mentioned. PanGo advertises several product lines, including Active RFID Tag, which uses RFID tags and 802.11 signal to track inventory.

Of the three WiFi vendors mentioned, only Ekahau makes a point of stressing that its inventory system is based only on WiFi and not RFID. So, apparently, the issue isn’t quite as clear cut as I first thought. Maybe it will take both technologies to deploy RTLSs the work for hospitals.

I also performed a related search on Google that included both “RFID” and “Wifi” [+("health care" OR hospital) +(inventory OR "asset management") +(RFID OR wifi OR wi-fi)], and an interesting thing happened—the majority of results on the first page were about RFID-based inventory systems for hospitals, rather than WiFi.

Hmm…. So does that mean there really are more vendors out there selling RFID RTLS products for hospitals, or just that they are better at SEO than their WiFi counterparts? <wink>

The jury obviously still is out on this one. What do you think?

Yesterday in this blog, I suggested that RFID tags might have been useful in containing the recent spinach-borne outbreak of E. coli. Apparently I’m not the only who had this idea. On Wednesday, an entry on the RFID Law Blog (published by McKenna Long & Aldridge, LLP Attorneys at Law) covered the same topic.

In the blog entry, the law firm suggested that the E. coli outbreak represents an opportunity for the RFID industry to proactively advocate for use of the technology, “instead of always being on the defensive.”

The entry also noted that “RFID tags on produce would make it much easier for public health officials to identify the specific source of the E. coli infestation.”

Using RFID tags in this way, the blog says, would be beneficial to consumers, retailers, and farmers. Make sense to me. What do you think?