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<html> <head> <title>RFID-Bulletin Board: Re: Samsys Technologies & International Paper, Mentat_99 at 6/24/2001 21:19</title> <!-- Anfang Header --><!-- Ende Header --> </head> <BODY BGCOLOR="#fffcf4"><!-- Anfang BeitragsseitenKopf --><!-- Ende BeitragsseitenKopf --><!-- AnfangBanner --><!-- EndeBanner --><blockquote> <center> <h1>Re: Samsys Technologies & International Paper</h1> </center><!-- Anfang BeitragsNavigationsLeisteOben --><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><center><P><B>[ <a href="../index.htm">RFID-Bulletin Board</a> ]</B></P></center><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><!-- Ende BeitragsNavigationsLeisteOben --><p>Written by <a href="mailto:Mentat_99@yahoo.com">Mentat_99</a> at 24 Jun 2001 21:19:00:<p>As an answer to: <a href="409.htm">Samsys Technologies & International Paper</a> written by C Mar at 02 Jun 2001 04:30:56:<p>>Anyone have news from the 'Town Test' underway in Baltimore with Motorola Bistatix, Samsys readers and IP packaging? Specifically I am trying to find information regarding the testing of TI, Phillips etc. tags in the test.<p>The Fast Track<br>www.informationweek.com <br>June 18, 2001<br>Tulsa, Okla., is the site of this summer's most innovative experiment in inventory management. A group of retailers,<br>manufacturers, and vendors-dubbed the Auto-ID Center-is wiring the entire city with analog radio-frequency gear that<br>can track packages equipped with microchips. <p>The system will make it possible to track inventory as it moves from point to point across the city. "We're putting RFID [radio-frequency<br>identification] chips on everything that moves," says John Balboni, VP of E-business at International Paper Co. in Stamford, Conn. The<br>group is still configuring the network design and determining how many radio-frequency receivers to install and where. <p>Like the other 35 members of the group-including Gillette, Philip Morris, Procter & Gamble, and Wal-Mart-the carton manufacturer paid<br>$300,000 to join in an effort to test the technology it plans to one day embed in its packaging products. The goal: for the RFID system to<br>track goods from plant to pallet to store shelf-all in real time and without human intervention. <p>That scenario is still a few years off, but some companies are already testing and implementing the devices in their logistics and supply<br>chains. The worldwide radio-frequency-tracking market generated just $27 million in sales last year, but it's projected to grow to 10 times<br>that size by 2004, according to Frost & Sullivan. And by Christmas, many retailers will test the devices in regions across the country on at<br>least their high-end merchandise, says Paul Mathans, business development manager at RFID manufacturer Intermec Inc. <p>Eventually, the wireless IDs are likely to replace many bar-code applications, in which retailers and manufacturers continue to invest.<br>Sears, Roebuck & Co. and Kmart Corp., for example, are deploying new bar-code systems to track inventory and improve customer<br>service as they prepare for the back-to-school and holiday shopping seasons. But radio-frequency devices offer certain benefits over bar<br>codes. The chips can be embedded in everything from shirt labels to lipstick tubes to the cartons in which products are shipped.<br>Information can be written to the devices at any point in the supply chain, and the chips can transmit data to servers automatically. <p>The devices emit radio waves that pass through packaging, making it possible to monitor the inventory inside a box without opening it. On<br>the store shelf, a small RFID receiver could track every time an item is moved and send that data via radio frequency to a local server. An<br>RFID-equipped retailer would be able to track when it's out of a shirt in a given size or color and have the system order more. Information<br>sent to in-store computers also would let salespeople tell customers where the items are-in the stockroom, at another store, or in a truck<br>en route-and when they'll arrive. The devices also can trigger alarms when someone tries to leave the store without paying for an item,<br>eliminating the need for security tags. <p>The Auto-ID Center's vision is for companies to register identification numbers on global domain servers, similar to domain names on the<br>Internet. The numbers would be transmitted by RFID tags to a global network of receivers along the supply chain-at airports, seaports,<br>highways, distribution centers, and retail stores. <p>International Paper's Balboni says many companies won't wait for a nationwide network. Instead, local<br>networks, such as the one in Tulsa, or individual retail or manufacturer networks will emerge first. "We have<br>several tests with retailers running right now," he says. <p>Among them are J. Crew and Gap Inc. J. Crew acknowledges the partnership but declined comment. "RFID<br>will be a competitive advantage, and retailers aren't anxious to share their future plans for supply-chain<br>technology with competitors," one supplier says. <p>Here's how it might work: Goods would be individually tagged with a unique "license plate" that identifies their<br>manufacturer, size, and color-so that when they arrive at a store's loading dock, the receivers know what the<br>carton contains and send that data to the supplier and to the company's enterprise resource planning,<br>supply-chain, and billing systems. On the store shelf, RFID emissions from the goods could be received 24<br>hours a day, feeding information on inventory to salespeople and to suppliers, and making it possible to keep<br>store shelves well-stocked. <p>Such precise tracking may raise privacy concerns. But the Auto-ID Center has an answer: Once a buyer<br>purchases an item, a store would deactivate the radio emission. What's more, a radio-frequency receiver must<br>be within three feet of a chip to track it. <p>One of the big benefits is that RFID systems would theoretically eliminate the need to conduct inventories by<br>hand. "Think about the kind of money retailers invest in inventorying their stores," says Tim Prieve, VP for go-to-market logistics for Retek<br>Inc., a retail software supplier that plans to integrate RFID with its products. "Twice a year, they disrupt their operations and count every<br>item. If I'm a retailer with 1,000 stores, and it costs me $20,000 to $30,000 per store per year to do that, I've got a pretty significant<br>investment." <p>The economic case will be easy to make when the devices drop from their current price of about 75 cents each to about 25 cents apiece,<br>Prieve says. "This is something you can lay out in front of your CEO in two sentences and he gets it," he says. "Retailers understand the<br>cost of being out of stock on the shelf-and know that 30% of the time the goods are in the store after all." <p>Cost wasn't an issue for the San Francisco International Airport, which next month will begin one of the first major commercial rollouts of<br>RFID technology. Its new baggage-tracking system will use a high-frequency system from SCS Corp. that includes a chip and microwave<br>antenna on an adhesive-backed strip. When ticket agents check in a passenger, the airline's computer system will automatically screen<br>for criteria that trigger security concerns-an expensive one-way international ticket paid for in cash at the counter, for example-and also<br>select customers at random for baggage screening. A pop-up screen will tell the agent to affix an RFID device to the passenger's bags. <p>From there, the bags are placed on the conveyer belt behind the ticket counter, just like any others. Radio-frequency receivers scan bags<br>as they travel the maze of conveyers in the luggage-handling system. When a receiver finds an RFID-tagged bag, it triggers levers to<br>automatically direct the bag to a security area, where it can be screened via cameras and sensors for explosives, chemicals, and other<br>hazardous materials. Now, employees must look for marked bags, physically remove them from the conveyer belts, open them, and<br>search them by hand. <p>In testing, the system is successfully routing 99.8% of the tagged bags, meaning that just one in about 400 needs to be handled<br>manually. "RFID is the centerpiece technology of the whole system, without which we couldn't make it work," says Mark Denari, the<br>airport's operations security coordinator. "And the application holds a much broader promise than where we are now." <p>The airport pays about 75 cents per RFID tag-not too big a bite out of its $10 million baggage-system upgrade budget, and a cost it<br>expects will fall by about 20% in the next few months. Denari says the airport will begin passing along the cost of the devices to the<br>airlines. Eventually, he sees the airport generating revenue by offering RFID tracking of all luggage as an outsourced service. <p>Other applications are in the works. Intermec has several projects under way to embed RFID devices in reusable plastic pallets used to<br>deliver fresh fruits and vegetables to supermarkets. <p>Checkpoint Systems Inc., a supplier of security tags and radio-frequency devices, has allied with Westvaco Corp., the nation's<br>second-largest supplier of cartons and packaging, to develop a system to embed the chips in cartons. It's also found a market for RFID in<br>more than 30 libraries and universities. Last week, the University of Connecticut announced that it's putting tags on every book. Rockefeller<br>University's library in New York has added them to 112,000 books and journals. Students insert their library cards in self-checkout<br>machines that deactivate the RFID tag so it clears security and updates the inventory system on who has the book. <p>Still, Sears is sticking with bar codes for retail shelves. "RFID is going to come into its own for logistics first, where I can put receivers on<br>the conveyor belt and track goods from manufacturer to truck," says Mike LeRoy, director of retail systems at Sears. "On the retail floor,<br>you'd have to have an antenna on every counter, and that means lots and lots of infrastructure." <p>In the meantime, Sears this month started handing out 15,000 SPT 1740 bar-code reading devices from Symbol Technologies Inc. to help<br>its salespeople check and replenish inventory, as well as speed up the delivery of large items to its merchandise pickup areas. The<br>handheld devices will connect to Sears' existing 802.11b-compatible wireless LAN network infrastructure, based on Cisco Systems'<br>Aironet technology. <p>Since March 15, Sears has been testing the system in six stores for price checking and to track the status of merchandise, LeRoy says.<br>On Saturday nights, for example, employees use the devices to check that the prices on the merchandise correspond with the sales<br>prices that will run in ads in the Sunday newspaper, and that items are displayed in the correct places. <p>Next month, Sears will use the new setup for replenishment and merchandise pickup applications and equip its employees with Zebra E3N<br>portable printers. That will make it possible to scan bins, tally up the inventory inside, create stock lists, and reorder goods through the<br>existing inventory system. <p>But even if retailers are taking it slowly, many people insist RFID will make today's inventory management even better-letting companies<br>automatically do what they do now by hand. "Most technologies work their way down the application curve from the high end," says<br>Intermec's Mathans. <p>Advocates have high expectations. Ultimately, they say, RFID tags could be used for consumer electronics, fraudulent-goods<br>identification, and movie rentals. <p>--with Matthew G. Nelson <p>Photo by John Bentham <p>-- Cheryl Rosen<p><p><br><br><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><form method=POST action="../wwwforum.cgi?formular"><input type=hidden name="followup" value="409,426"><input type=hidden name="origname" value="Mentat_99"><input type=hidden name="origemail" value="Mentat_99@yahoo.com"><input type=hidden name="origsubject" value="Re: Samsys Technologies & International Paper"><input type=hidden name="origdate" value="24 Jun 2001 21:19:00"><input type=hidden name="subject" value="Re: Samsys Technologies & International Paper"><input type="submit" name="abschicken" value="Write an answer"> <br><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><p><a name="followups"><B>List of answers:</B></a><br><ul><!--insert: 426--></ul><!--end: 426--><!-- Anfang BeitragsNavigationsLeisteUnten --><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><center><P><B>[ <a href="../index.htm">RFID-Bulletin Board</a> ]</B></P></center><!-- AnfangLinie --><center><p><HR></p></center><!-- EndeLinie --><!-- Ende BeitragsNavigationsLeisteUnten --></blockquote><!-- Anfang BeitragsseitenFuss --><!-- Ende BeitragsseitenFuss --></body></html>⌨️ 快捷键说明
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