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• General [329]

Organizations employing fieldworkers all have business influences such as worker productivity, customer service and cost reduction that flow directly to the bottom line profitability of the business.

Commercial and Residential HVAC, Utility Power Generation and Distribution, Subway, Railway, Electrical Contractors, Commercial Lamping and relamping, Mechanical Contractors, White Goods Repair, Commercial Freezers and Cooling Repair, Plumbers, ATM Service and more carry specialized inventories that are needed to perform the correct services within a reasonable timeframe.

While many of these service organizations are now using mobile devices for dispatch and collecting some service information, RFID technology offers a superior benefit over manual data entry or bar code technology.

RFID tags can be read when dusty or dirty and in almost any environmental condition offering a superior alternative to inaccurate manual data entry or bar code label technology that does not have the life or readability rate that RFID tags do. Some RFID tags also have additional memory capacity making them ideal for the fieldworker industries to store maintenance and repair histories.

Organizations that repair and maintain assets can utilize RFID technology to reduce the number of parts required on a service vehicle, eliminate manual data entry, improve productivity, and improve customer service. These benefits all contribute to the overall health and profitability of the business.

When a field worker reads an RFID tag they accurately identify the asset. The RFID reader dates and time stamps this read eliminating the need for the worker to enter a start and stop time of the repair.

Economical paper RFID labels can be used to accurately identify the parts required for the repair and memory RFID tags can be utilized on the asset to collect the history of what work was performed, eliminating the need to be in constant contact with the dispatch office in order to "know" what happened in the past and what "should be" required to fix or maintain the asset.

The benefits of fieldworker RFID technology further extends into the vehicle replenishment system, the vehicle service history, accurate forecasting of inventory requirements, reduction of standing inventories, increasing accuracy of service scheduling, improving fieldworker Key Performance Indicators, and increasing first time service rates. RFID technology has excellent ROI when applied to mobile field service industries.

GAO RFID Inc. has an experienced RFID Engineering Team to provide the professional design, deployment, integration, training and customer service that will maximize your return-on-investment. To find out how we can solve the challenges in your field service environment, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com or call us at (416) 292-0038, ext. 601.

Efficient fleet maintenance is absolutely necessary given today's high equipment costs and climbing operating expenses. Whether you are involved in LTL, cartage, courier, direct store delivery (DSD) or field service operations, an integrated and cost effective fleet maintenance program is a prerequisite to increased profitability.

An improperly designed maintenance program can result in:

• Project delays and cost over-runs
• Too much technology
• The wrong technology
• Prematurely obsolete proprietary solutions

Fleet Maintenance with GAO RFID

GAO RFID technology can address many of the on-going concerns that Fleet Managers deal with on a day-to-day basis. GAO RFID provides a variety of solutions suitable for many fields, such as the commercial, government, and private sectors. Our approach is to use open standards RFID technology in a way that will maximize your fleet management resources. A GAO RFID solution will not only help you grow your business, but will also prepare you to adopt future technologies easier. For example, by placing RFID tags on critical assets that require regular maintenance GAO can develop a solution that will give you accurate maintenance and usage history as well as reduce parts inventory and eliminate obsolete parts. Service data can be recorded directly onto RFID tags. That way service history is readily available anywhere the fleet vehicle goes. In addition, once a vehicle is tagged it's movements can be recorded anywhere in an RFID enabled yard or depot.

GAO RFID benefits include:

1. Fast and accurate check-in, fueling, and weighing;
2. Tire maintenance improvements;
3. Locating and monitoring of vehicles within the RFID equipped zone (knowing accurately and in real-time which vehicles are in the compound and which vehicles are on the road);
4. Automated record keeping of maintenance checks and repairs;
5. Accurate coordination of preventative maintenance whether based on mileage driven or motor runtimes or a combination of both;
6. On-line access to logs of previous maintenance work;
7. Automated inventory control and procurement of spare parts;
8. Improved equipment utilization;
9. Better use of labor pool;
10. Minimize errors

GAO RFID Inc. Fleet Maintenance Solutions include mobile and fixed scanners, mobile computers and radio frequency identification (RFID) systems, along with applications from industry-leading partners, to help you streamline your maintenance operations. By capturing, moving and managing vehicle data across your enterprise, our solutions reduce truck maintenance costs and optimize fleet utilization.

GAO RFID technology will help reduce vehicle downtime by ensuring fixes are made only when necessary - rather than according to a pre-established plan, and therefore greatly increase overall efficiency of the fleet and profitability of your business.

To learn more on how GAO RFID can help you maintain your fleet for greater profit and less risk; please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com or call us at (416) 292-0038, ext. 601.

Most organizations today require a performing and efficient access control system. There are many reasons for having such a system and these include:

1) Enhanced security to limit access to restricted areas,
2) Tracking employee activity,
3) Improve loss prevention and
4) Compliance to higher internal or government regulated security measures post 9-11 to name just a few.

RFID technology is quickly becoming a popular choice since the advancement in technology makes a variety of solutions available to any organization.

There are major deficiencies in the legacy solutions that use the traditional access control systems. Barcodes, magnetic stripes, and proximity readers all rely on the user to either make contact or place the badge very close to the reader. In addition, bar codes can only be read one at a time and the respective embedded information cannot be updated. Such limitations can be cumbersome and time consuming.

An RFID access control system can provide an easy and efficient solution. RFID badges can be read from much further distances than other traditional technologies and the embedded electronic information for each badge can be over-written repeatedly. The increased reading distance thus enables other tracking technologies like surveillance cameras to be activated in conjunction with an employee being in their vicinity. Furthermore, multiple RFID badges can be read all at the same time. Information about employee access, attendance, and duties performed, can be easily and efficiently monitored and stored in a database. Access information can also be tied to a Windows Active Directory or LDAP for user authentication and therefore be synchronized to an authorized access scheme..

GAO RIFD Badge and Access Control Solution:

GAO RFID implements a variety of solutions that solve the access control concerns of an organization. Innovative GAO solutions will help a company improve security and make employee activity tracking an easy and efficient task. Our systems can be designed to ensure that an organization is compliant with the latest government security regulations and construct or improve the current loss prevention program. These benefits will make an immediate impact and, over time, will improve efficiency and significantly reduce or even eliminate losses.

GAO RFID offers a variety of cards and readers that either fit perfectly in your organization's environment or can be easily customized to do so. In addition, our systems are designed with employee privacy in mind, since our solutions are constructed to track only the information intended, while keeping an ethical approach to employee privacy.

For more information on how GAO RFID can be the right solution for your company's access control concerns please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com or call us at (416) 292-0038, ext. 601.

RFID technology is facilitating a major innovation to supply chain management. From an article by John Lorinc in the December, 2006 edition of the Globe & Mail Report on Business Magazine, “Every year, according to an expert cited by the Federal Trade Commission, American merchants lose as much as $300 billion (US) in revenues because they’ve lost track of goods somewhere on the journey between factory and store shelf.” Lost revenues are not the only concern in the supply chain, improving the productivity in transporting goods and securing the source of goods are also of concern to professionals managing the supply chain. RFID technology delivers solutions to all these needs.

Overview:
Where does an organization start to realize the benefits of RFID? To answer this, an overview on the technology is a good start. The concept behind RFID is simple; an item (the product, or a pallet) has an RFID tag attached to it. The tag contains a small integrated circuit (IC) chip that contains a unique ID and an antenna that allows it to communicate to an RFID reader. When the tag is attached to the product or pallet and then ‘read’ by the RFID reader, that unique ID is then associated with the product or pallet through your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. This unique ID stays for the remaining part of product’s journey from the factory, right through the consumer’s purchase at the retailer. The RFID readers are then placed at all key junction

points in the supply chain. As the products or pallets pass through these readers, your ERP system is updated immediately on the flow of goods. This automation in the process reduces time spent with manual entry and the potential for human error of bill-of-lading details, provides real time updates on where goods are, makes more secure the integrity of your product shipments and helps you address bottlenecks in the system faster.

A Starting Point:
Therefore a good starting point to deploy RFID technology is at the pallet or carton/container level. Goods assembled in these vessels are then tracked in batches defined at the source. The benefits, here, are that fewer tags are needed, since a single tag is identified with a ‘batch’ of goods instead of the individual unit of product. Another benefit of tagging the pallets and containers is to continuously track the whereabouts of these vessels used to move the goods and this helps to cut down these assets being lost in the supply chain and needing to be replaced. Another reason to start an RFID solution at the container level is because many individual products pose challenges for RFID technology by the way they are packaged. Metal goods, goods that contain liquids and very small items pose a challenge to doing individual item tracking. RFID solutions are available here, but the cost goes up considerably. The direction of the technology is toward tracking all individual units of products. With advances in RFID technology, costs per tag will be driven lower and this will allow more RFID tagging of individual product units.

Open Standards:
The realization of the benefits of RFID technology is also very dependent on open standards in the industry. Open standards will allow manufacturers, distributors and retailer to use a common type of tag(s) and reader(s) while allowing this hardware to interact with their own ERP needs and deliver the efficiencies promised by RFID technology. EPCglobal Inc., the standards body that manages UPC (Universal Product Code) information in bar codes, sets the standards for how basic product information is encoded in the RFID chips. The standard set for supply chain management is referred to as “GEN 2”. GEN 2 has brought significant advantages over the previous evolving standards of “Class 0” and “Gen 1” and these include:
(a) GEN 2 can write to tags multiple times,
(b) GEN 2 has longer read ranges,
(c) GEN 2 has greater data storage capacity and
(d) GEN 2 has more reliable and faster read rates.

GAO RFID Solutions for SCM:
For more information on how RFID technology can help your challenges in the supply chain, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com or call us at (416) 292-0038, ext. 601.

Parking lot operators, whether public or private, face a number of challenges such as:

1. The inability to accurately and intelligently identify, collect and record the data of the vehicles that enter and leave the parking lot then processing this data to better analyze traffic patterns and facilitate client billings.
2. Need to increase the security (and user integrity) of the parking lot.
3. Adding human resources, especially in peak traffic times that burdens operating costs and reduces profitability.
4. Line-ups created for parking payments, especially during peak traffic times that reduces the service levels to customers.

GAO RFID has launched an intelligent parking control management system that integrates RFID technology, automatic control technology and applications software. The RFID tag on the vehicle will be able to automate the in and out privileges of the subscriber and then transfer this data to the enterprise software for the above-mentioned benefits of traffic analysis that allow you to optimize the human resources needed for traffic flow in and out. For customer payment, the RFID tag can be read to debit a pre-pay system or charge the parking services against a credit card. All of this will facilitate customers entering and leaving and this improves service levels and increases capacity in the parking lot. These benefits will drive higher revenues.

This intelligent parking lot system is composed of RFID tags (for the vehicles), readers stationed around entry and exit points, applications software (that can be customized for your specific needs) and then networked using TCP/IP network communication protocol. The system is flexible to allow a human interference, if necessary, to be able to accommodate unusual events such as when the non-tagged vehicles enter.

To learn more about how a GAO RFID Parking Control system can enhance the service levels to customers, improve security and drive more revenue, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com or call us at (416) 292-0038, ext. 601.

Railroads face a complex set of economic and operational challenges like competitive freight pricing, asset utilization and competition with trucking, capital expenditure levels, industry consolidation and debt management. Technology applications from GAORFID can aid the rail industry to evolve business solutions in enhancing revenue growth while reducing cost through efficient operations, maintenance, asset utilization and capacity management.

The GAO RFID systems technology provides exact location and status of any individual objectives mentioned above, and predicts their dynamic changes from the system, particularly the change of rail-wagon throughput at the marshalling sites, interface between local railways, confine interface. This enables timely, accurate and integral information and decision assistance for the management of train transportation and the customer. The system contains the sub-systems of Confirmation, Freight Billing, Transportation Planning, Train Marshalling, Train Dispatching, Real-time Tracking of Train and Container, Prediction of Train Throughput and Revenue Run, etc. GAO RFID provides end-to-end Railroad / Transit application management services

APPLICATIONS

A GAO RFID Railway system is available in a number of configurations designed to economically meet a full range of service requirements. Reader systems provide automated tracking of railcars via RFID tags, and make railcar location information available to railroads for asset management and other purposes.

• Traffic and Passenger Information: The system provides accurate and reliable information about where a train is located. This real-time information is forwarded to IT systems and used to update the passenger information displays at stations and terminals.
• Operation and Maintenance: Precise information about the configuration of wagons within a train can be provided automatically by the system. This information can be integrated with other systems such as track inspection systems, so that the recorded information can be automatically matched to the actual wagon, thus eliminating errors.
• Location of the Train: The System with the help of the reader determines the location of the train by reading the tag identity as the train passes over the tag at speed. This location data is transferred to the onboard system and can be used to update passenger information automatically
• Controlling and Positioning of Trains: Some onboard systems require a precise position of the train, for example to control stopping positions. The reader accurately reports the position when the train passes over an ID-tag.

In combination with requirements new applications can be rapidly prototyped and deployed. In addition to the standard configuration, our team of experienced engineers can design systems to meet specific application requirements. Some of the customized applications developed to integrate with the system

• Track Inspection System
• Signal Asset Tracking System
• Safety Audit
• Inventory and Maintenance
• Equipment Distribution and Management
• Car Accounting Systems
• Rail Yard Information Management

FEATURES/BENEFITS

• The System stores tag data including time, date, train direction and speed.
• It also responds to inquiries via modem and interfaces to scales, video systems and diagnostic and monitoring devices.
• Timely data to increase capacity, speed, automation and operational flexibility
• Arrival and departure data for signal and control operations

GAO Products for demanding RAIL RFID Applications

RFID technology developed a range of readers and ID-tags that fulfils the tough requirements of the rail industry. These products are used worldwide in railway applications which require identification and positioning at high speed, with high precision and in demanding environments.

GAO ID-tags
The ID-tags are mounted on the front, side, top or underneath each individual vehicle or on the sleepers in special tag fixings. The ID-tag is an extremely resistant, totally encapsulated and maintenance free. It has a predictable life of 6, 8 or 10 years, depending on model.

GAO Fixed Reader
Standard readers are suitable for Rail track-side installations. Readers can be installed at key locations such as stations, terminal entrances or maintenance locations. The reader identifies the ID-tag at a range of up to 6 meters and at passage speeds of up to 300km/h.

GAO Handheld Reader
The Handheld a 2.45 GHz RFID reader. The versatility of the industrial PDA together with the flexibility of RFID technology makes the Handheld reader an ideal supplement to stationary readers in applications such as train maintenance. The reader allows for quick and reliable on-the-spot identification and verification of objects such as wagons.

GAO Heavy Duty reader
Heavy Duty readers are ruggedized, designed to withstand environmental factors such as temperature, moisture, shock and vibration. This allows them to be mounted directly on the outside of vehicles. This reader can be used to provide positioning information for onboard systems on a train.

GAO RFID has a solution for the unique challenges of your rail or inter-modal operations. To learn more, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com.

For today’s manufacturer, processing lines can be immense and complex constructs and the volume of materials and goods flowing through them can also be staggering. Timing and materials’ coordination are critical functions through these processes that determine the level of profitability for your operation. This is why manufacturers today look to RFID technology to help them run more efficient operations that help minimize production down time, optimize material and parts inventories, improve and maintain optimal labour output.

GAO RFID solutions are ideal for manufacturers who build several products on a single production line, or manufacture complex or customized products. Assembly line personnel could use an RFID reader to verify which processes have been completed, to determine which inspections or tests

are required and to automatically update the central production database. And production planners and inventory control personnel could use the GAO RFID tags to automatically update the customer database and finished goods inventory, using an RFID reader and PC, rather than manually creating data entry sheets, which could introduce errors into the system. In addition, GAO RFID system shows the real-time location and status of each single component in all processing lines.

Benefit Real-time tracking of inventory, part kits and sub-assemblies. Maintains current item information on the tag - ideal for managing production of complex or customized products and assemblies, eliminates the need for separate paperwork on assembly status and content Can automatically notify the central product database when each process has been completed Field personnel could use RFID tag to determine product features, date of manufacture, revision levels.

GAO RFID Inc. has a very capable RFID Engineering Team to provide the professional design, deployment, integration, training and customer service that will maximize your return-on-investment. To find out if we have a solution for the challenges in your manufacturing environment that will keep you ahead of the competition, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com, or call us at 416-292-0038, ext 601.

It is well known that the adoption of RFID is happening around the globe. But where are the success stories and in which market sectors? One industry that has realized the benefits of RFID technology for several years is the Livestock industry.

There are a host of challenges facing livestock farmers today. The livestock owners faces increased competition in global markets, disease control and better breeding practices to name just some of the issues. In the past, other technologies, such as bar coding were attempted to track livestock. There are, however, problems with bar codes, such as the time and labour to scan each bar code, and the bar codes were often dirty or damaged, making it difficult or impossible to read them.

RFID technology answers the needs for livestock owners who look to improve profitability and reduce risk in the herds they manage. RFID systems are being used as a means of identifying farm animals and collecting data far more quickly and efficiently than can be done by writing down numbers by hand or scanning a barcode on a plastic tag in an animal’s ear. Government agencies too, around the world, are in favor of RFID, because it enables them to link a unique identification number for each animal to a database that includes information specific to that animal, including date of birth, inoculations, sex and breeding specifics.

The GAO RFID Livestock Solution:

As a fast growing company, GAO RFID has been specializing in the livestock identification. A GAO RFID Tag (Readable/ Write-able) would dramatically improve the ability to track livestock with long range and high throughput capability and maintain accurate and up-to-date information. Being able to identify animals and link them to the herd they came from and every location they went to in the supply chain helps control the spread of diseases, such as BCE, bovine tuberculosis, hoof-and-mouth and other diseases. Several countries, including Canada, are moving forward with national ID plans that require RFID.

To learn more on how GAO RFID can help you manage your herd for greater profit and less risk visit http://livestock.gaorfid.com/ or contact us at sales@gaorfid.com.

Imagine the hospital of the future where unnecessary expenses will be cut and more patient lives will be saved. Say goodbye to the inefficiencies of the old hospital and welcome the new, highly cost-effective system of asset and personnel tracking, patient care, and billing, the keystone of which will be radio frequency identification (RFID) technology.

GAO RFID envisions such a world, as we are a leading RFID solutions provider. The applications for the healthcare industry are several, asset tracking, patient tracking, staff location, baby monitoring, blood bank distribution, etc. Here we define two such applications:

Asset Tracking:

Healthcare facilities invest millions of dollars in upgrading and maintaining expensive equipment that aid the healthcare professional in the diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of patients. It is incumbent on these professionals to maximize the use of such machines to maintain cost controls and yet meet the ever evolving and extremely dynamic needs of the patients. When the equipment needed is not readily available this leads to many undesirable outcomes:
(1) Staff are then sent scrambling through many corridors, sometimes over many floors to find the equipment they need,
(2) The Facility procures added machinery that taxes capital resources while existing assets remain under-utilized and
(3) The patients very well being could be at risk without the machine available at the time it is needed.

RFID technology solves all of the above by simply affixing an RFID tag to the equipment and strategically locating readers throughout the area of operations where the hardware is needed. In this way, as the device passes through a read point, it is registered in the applications software in real time to be in that area. In this way, staff will know what area of the facility each piece of equipment is located when they really need to have it. The results are less time wasted for healthcare professionals scrambling to find equipment, better utilization of existing assets that reduces capital expenditures and most importantly, a patient gets the best care available reducing the likelihood of liability because of poor health care services.

Patient Tracking Solutions:

Hospitals and Health Care facilities are more concerned these days about having the ability to accurately track their patients. Whether it’s dispensing medication or identifying the individual for procedures or pulling up a history of treatment on a patient; RFID technology is a way to manage the information much more efficiently.

An RFID system is used for accurately locating and tracking people, equipment and objects in a hospital. The system is designed to track hospital assets, curb excess expenditures, increase safety and ensure security and access control by placing small radio frequency identification devices, or ‘RFID tags’ on people and objects.

Hospitals and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) are facing daily challenges especially when responding to disasters, such as severe weather conditions, toxic chemical spills and terrorism. They need to manage a large quantity of patients from the disaster area to nearby hospitals effectively and efficiently.

The responsibility for the safety of patients, who may be missing from hospital beds or emergency wards rests with the healthcare worker. RFID makes tracking patients easier giving care takers the ability for fast, accurate identification and verification.

• Encoded RFID Bracelet data can be read through bed linens, so patients don’t have to be disturbed when sleeping. They can be used with fixed readers in doorways and corridors, to help staff keep track of ambulatory patients.
• RFID Bracelet solutions can encode patient information in RFID tags to have better tracking performance especially when access to a remote database is not available.
• RFID Bracelet solutions provide a convenient, one-step solution for patient IDs. Text or graphics are produced directly on the Bracelet. There is no need for handwritten or typed inserts, or stick-on labels, which saves time and eliminates a potential point of failure.

Newborn Baby Tracking Solutions
For the most part, the Maternity Ward is thankfully a great source for joy and celebration as new family members are welcomed into the world. The ward staff shares some of this joy by playing their part throughout the labor and the post-partum care of mother and newborn child. However anxiety levels rise for the patients, families and staff when there are complications during the labor and/or when the newborn needs neonatal care. In many of these instances the baby and the mother need to be separated, a scenario that creates anxiety. Anxiety can easily turn to anger and a possible law suit when there is a mother-baby mix up; the wrong baby being sent to the wrong mother for the crucial early bonding period, breast-feeding etc.

RFID technology will help both these difficult and challenging situations. At the time of admittance the mother is provided with a patient’s RFID tag that will start the process of tracking all procedures relevant to that labor. Once the child is born, an ankle tag is provided to the baby as well and immediately cross-referenced to the baby’s mother and the mother’s tag.

Family Access to Babies in Neonatal Care:

In the case of the newborn needing neonatal care, family members are almost as anxious as the new mother, to greet and bond with the new family member. When the newborn needs to be in an intensive care unit (ICU) this becomes very difficult due to the restricted access in the ICU. RFID solves this problem by making available to families the ability to view on a computer monitor outside of the ICU the key data about the baby, a photograph, the height, weight, skin color and temperature after keying in, for example, the mother’s family name and first name.

Mother-Baby Mix-ups Eliminated:
Even when the mix up is uncovered moments after the mistake is made, this can cause heightened levels of anger and dissatisfaction with the services rendered. Any mother-baby mix up is a potential liability to the hospital. This scenario can be guaranteed not to happen when staff follows a procedure of reading the baby’s tag and then reading the mother’s tag and re-confirming the match that was initiated at the birth.

GAORFID Solution:
GAO RFID can bring a turnkey RFID solution to your asset tracking and patient tracking challenges for any medical facility including the hardware, software and systems integration services. To learn more about how RFID technology can help solve your patient tracking needs, please contact us at sales@gaorfid.com.

Institutional (academic) libraries and public libraries face growing challenges in managing the assets of their collection and maintaining or improving service levels to patrons.

Over the past twenty years, libraries have grown their services to their patrons from simply offering books and periodicals to now adding multi-media items such as videos, CDs and DVDs. Add to this the fact that many libraries provide patrons computers to access the Internet as another source for information. Throughout this growth in material resources offered by libraries there are also growing concerns on the security of the collection assets and maintaining (or improving) service levels to the patrons. Throughout this time, many municipalities and institutions who manage our library systems have sought ways to reduce operating budgets (cut staff) to offset the growing capital costs of the multi-media resources and computer hardware.

For the concerns that library managers face each day, RFID technology brings solutions that magnetic stripe or barcode technology simply cannot deliver as effectively. The RFID tag is assigned and attached to the asset in similar ways, depending on the material, paper, plastics, etc. The advantages of RFID tags over barcode or magnetic stripe are as follows:

1. Faster scanning of the data stored on the RFID tag,
   
2. Simple and easy way for patrons to self-checking for material loans and returns,
   
3. Superior detection rates,
   
4. Significantly reduce the number of false alarms at the exit sensors (up to 75% less)
   
5. High speed inventory - reducing time to by staff for 'shelf-reading' and other inventory activities,
   
6. Automated return of materials that speeds up sorting of materials and re-shelving for the next patron to access and
   
7. A longer lifecycle than a barcode.

The ability of any enterprise to effectively monitor it's manufacturing facility and "work in progress" has been an elusive or costly endeavor. However, with the introduction of RFID technologies and its application to the manufacturing process such initiatives are now well within reach.

RFID by its very nature has the ability to read tags or labels over distances and multiple or batches simultaneously. Other RFID initiatives provide the ability to write data to a tag multiple times.

A proposed solution to accurately monitor work in progress on the manufacturing floor of Aerospace companies can be described as follows:

Each manufacturing operation step is installed with an RFID reader.

The unique ID for each reader provides the enterprise with a granular representation of the shop floor.

Each piece of work or component is affixed with a tag (or in the instance of palletized small pieces, the pallet can be tagged and read and the software would determine the pieces used per operation)

When a piece arrives for machining or processing the tag is read and the unique ID is time and date stamped and sent to the database.

The workflow software will then provide the means by which the work in progress can be monitored and associated with specific job orders.

The ability to see work in progress at any given time will have beneficial results in that sales people will be able to communicate more accurate ETAs on placed orders. Production managers can use the information to assess production bottlenecks and validate the accuracy of lean manufacturing initiatives.

An RFID strategy provides an outline to use the technology aligned with an enterprise's strategic visions and goals. A business that strives to be a model of efficiency could use RFID to streamline the operations is a typical example. The RFID strategy is applicable whether big or small business because RFID is going to be found anywhere in the near future.

An uniform strategy is not going to work generally that means the businesses must create their own unique RFID strategy. In addition, any business has to determine how RFID can create value that is aligned with its strategic directions, meeting customer RFID mandates are within the tolerable cost and risk ranges.

Do not mistake the creation of an RFID strategy for a needless corporate process that you can short-circuit to delve right into the excitement of implementation. Such a short-circuited implementation, although perhaps successful in the eyes of the implementers, might come to be viewed as a failure or useless by other parts of the business. Post-implementation use of the technology might be questioned, leading to frustration and demoralization of the technology supporters. You can avoid these types of situation by ensuring the comprehensive RFID strategy.

The fundamental reasons for establishing an RFID strategy include determining the various impacts of RFID technology, ensuring basic understanding and buy-in from senior management, deployment strategies, and other policies can drive and guaranteeing cross-functional support.

RFID is a tool that business must apply thoughtfully to realize its benefits. Otherwise, the use of the technology might turn out to be a deficit spending. For example, operational efficiencies might go down, cost might rise, resulting in lost revenue and missed opportunities. Therefore, businesses gain by not using RFID technology before determine how best to use it and how that use will impact their processes and personnel. When decision makers do decide to deploy RFID, a comprehensive strategy enables them to validate its use via justification analysis and pilot implementation results. Thus, enterprises can focus on areas that align properly with their line of business and that promise the maximum return on investment while significantly eliminating misdirected efforts.

An RFID strategy can show the potential benefits of using the technology at a level that can be viewed, analyzed, and understood by senior decision makers. In general, each decision maker has his own special interests and priorities. The viability of a plan in the long run depends on how these people perceive the plan and understand its benefits for them in their individual endeavors. Therefore, an RFID strategy should cater to a broader set of interests rather than seek to satisfy the minor needs. The best way to achieve this goal is to create a strategy that aligns with the core competencies and strategic direction of the business instead of focusing on isolated areas of benefit. Such an integrated plan, when validated and supported at the highest level of decision making that can provide a path of realization that is less cluttered with internal politics, funding nightmares, and deployment-decision delays. The implementation of a successful RFID system being as nontrivial as it gets, having these elements under control will enable control will enable the adopters to focus on solution delivery, which is by no means a small achievement in a business environment. In addition, an RFID strategy ensures that if the technology meets the benefit expectations, it will be assimilated into the other parts of business in the long run.

An RFID strategy can drive the next level of activities, such as estimating the technology benefits, estimating the cost of implementation and creating a deployment strategy. The outcome of some of these activities can provide further evidence to validate the strategy objectively. Indeed, the strategy needs to be validated periodically from the results of the adoption efforts. Such validation can help the proposer support his credibility and can strengthen the case for use of RFID in the business.

For a business, the RFID strategy provides an enterprise-level plan that aligns with overall business goals and strategies. When formulated at this level, a RFID strategy offers benefits to the widest range of interested parties and facilitates buy-in from senior management. It is strongly recommended that you have a RFID strategy in place before attempting any effort to deploy the technology. You can use an RFID strategy to drive action plans for an enterprise RFID policy, implementation, and technology rollout.

The full EPC Class Structure is:

as
Figure: EPC Class Structure

The Class 0 designation was added to the Generation 1 system long after the Class 1 specification was created, as part of the process described in 1.i above. Class 1 tags, of which 'Generation 2' is an example, contain a write once memory for storing an Electronic Product Code. Class 2 tags add additional memory that can be changed fre-quently, for storing additional data ?for example from an onboard sensor. Class 3 tags add batteries for longer read ranges and higher reliability, but are fundamentally passive backscatter tags. Class 4 tags are essentially active tags that can communicate with other Class 4 tags as well as readers. Class 5 tags are not really tags at all - they are essentially wireless networked readers.

High volume, general availability of Generation 2 tags is expected some time in this moment. However, Generation 1 tags will not disappear from the sup-ply chain: instead Generations 1 and 2 will coexist for 6 to12 months while the Generation 2 learning curve ramps up. Depending on Generation 2 price and perfor-mance, and market conditions, this 'Generation 1 Shadow' could last until early 2007, when Generation 1 tags finally disappear from the supply chain. Tag technology will continue to evolve; around the time Generation 2 becomes established around 2006/7, end users and technology vendors expect work to begin on developing a 'Generation 3' system with further improvements to Generation 2 technology.

GAO RFID Inc. currently offers GEN 2 tags, and we can foresee that GEN 2 tags will dominate the supply chain market. GEN 2 tags represent the next generation of RFID technology and have the same potential as active tags.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), an automatic recognition technology employing wireless communications, has recently drawn much attention. RFID tags, both passive tags and active tags are broadly used in virtually every industry in the world. Today, this paper will introduce how the active tag works and also discuss some applications.

An active tag is an RFID tag that incorporates a battery, and can communicate with a reader that is several tens of meters away (there are tags that can communicate at several hundreds of meters). While passive tags can only respond to an electromagnetic wave signal emitted from a reader, active tags can also spontaneously transmit an ID. There are various types of transmission formats such as a common periodic transmission type, or the unscheduled transmission type such as when there are changes in vibration or temperature or when a button is pushed. In many cases, the ID data comprise several tens of bits. Generally, systems that employ active tags comprise the tags, a reader, and a server. The tag spontaneously transmits its ID. For example, if the tag is a periodic transmitting type, the tag broadcasts its ID at a predetermined time interval. When the reader receives the ID, it notifies the server of the ID via the network, and based on the ID the server executes the target service.

There are several active tag applications. Some innovative uses for active tags have been employed especially in the movement of human beings. For instance active tag technology has be used for tracking the movement of kindergarten children. Parents or guardians can view their children in kindergarten via the Internet by utilizing the active tags. Active tags are attached to the nametags of the children, and the classrooms and playgrounds are equipped with a reader and a Web camera. Based on this, by accessing the Internet the children can be viewed in real time and in their actual surroundings. The parents or guardians can readily select video images of their children.

Another deployment used active tags as an effective tool in monitoring grade school children on the way to and from School. Since the incidences of child abduction have increased, the application of active tags has been investigated. The backpacks of the children are equipped with a tag and readers are installed along the route to school and at the school gate. When a child passes by a location that is equipped with a reader, the ID is transmitted and the school and the parents or guardians are notified. By using this system, the teachers and the parents or guardians are alerted of any deviation in the commute to school.

Active tag technology also can be used for human subject identification when used in conjunction with a video surveillance system. Through the interaction of monitoring cameras and an active tag system, images recorded at the same time that ID data is read and recorded, provides an effective method for identifying criminal activity. For example, it would be very efficient to use the ID of an abducted person as a search key in an image search of a video database to identify a segment of surveillance video for evidence.

Furthermore, active tag technology can be very important for promotion and marketing. In department stores and supermarkets, if customers carried tags, their movements can be tracked inside the store, and based on their context history such as movement habits or purchasing history, the vendor can maximize positioned selling displays based on customer movement.

The final example is authentication and settlement. The use of contact-less IC cards for ticket examination in traffic systems has increased, and the system has become very convenient. To advance this concept further, if active tags can be used in authentication, it would even save the trouble of taking out a card. This type of process would become effortless and the level of convenience would increase even more. Of course, being billed for simply coming into close proximity of these readers would be problematic, and an authentication and settlement scheme that prevents illegal acts such as impersonation is needed.

In this way, applications that use active tags have a wide range and have the potential to become the basic identification method for future ubiquitous services.