RFID TECHNOLOGY
2.3 RFID IMPLEMENTATION EXAMPLES
them into a service-oriented architecture. This gives the DoD high levels of asset visibility.
webMethods’ Enterprise Services Platform, a component of webMethods Fabric combines proven application integration capabilities and event- driven technology with a distributed service-oriented architecture to create an integration infrastructure. The Enterprise Services Platform can incorpo- rate all Web services, including those exposed using proprietary integration products from other vendors, application servers, and SOA modules being developed by packaged application vendors.
2.2.4.4.2 TIBCO: EDA Middleware
TIBCO’s Track and Trace Solution gives managers and executives a real- time view of order and inventory information by incorporating EPC and business information across organizations and their network of suppliers and distributors. This enables them to better monitor the changes in supply and demand.
Behind this solution is TIBCO’s Event-Driven Architecture (EDA) that TIBCO overlaps with SOA in an architectural framework to increase asset visibility across the supply chain. This framework is particularly important for better inventory control and management based on faster turnaround times of alerts in real-time on problems with tracing and tracking the cases and pallets.
Example 1: METRO Group: IBM RFID Servers in Early Deployment
METRO Group hired IBM to provide middleware and installation services for the RFID rollout that began in November 2004 with shipments of warehouse pallets and cases from 20 product sup- pliers, including Unilever, Procter & Gamble, Gillette, Johnson
& Johnson, Kraft Foods, Colgate-Palmolive, GlaxoSmithKline, Nestlé, and Esprit. METRO Group has used an IBM RFID mid- dleware based on the IBM WebSphere RFID Premises Server to provide the retailer with a virtual view of RFID-tagged pallets and cases shipped to its distribution center and exchange data with METRO’s merchandise management system.
METRO’s RFID rollout is expected to grow to about 100 suppliers by December and about 300 suppliers by 2006, along with addi- tional METRO warehouses and stores in Germany. Early deploy- ment in November 2004 was influenced by METRO’S belief that the results of the Future Store Initiative indicated that process efficiency and merchandise availability increased by about ten percent and losses and theft were reduced about fifteen percent.
Smart Chips were affixed to the pallets.
Example 2: Gillette: Redirecting Misplaced Case
One demonstration in late September 2004 linked Gillette’s RFID network to a reader at the Baltimore Convention Center where the EPCglobal U.S. Conference was held. The scenario showed how a tagged case of Gillette Venus razor blades got separated from the shipment it was part of, and how the company used EPCglobal Network to identify the misplaced case, and how a discovery station responded to a query and displayed the infor- mation about the case. A Gillette warehouse employee used the information to reorder and redirect the case to the correct Gillette dock door for correct shipping. Gillette’s discovery station used the EPCglobal Network Object Name Service (ONS) offered by Verisign to provide authentication services.
Example 3: Canus (Speed of Tag Reads versus Quality of Computer Input)
Canus, a maker of goat’s milk, is meeting Wal-Mart’s tagging requirements ahead of schedule. The RFID technology monitors
temperature of its products in real-time to keep the products from spoiling in transit. The deployment uses UHF readers and tags from Alien Technology.
Adjustments had to be made to software and hardware. For instance, the speed of tags affected the quality of input reads into the computers. It found that reading tags at one-second intervals was the optimal speed. Anything less than one second slowed down the computer.
In another instance, the Canus docking door allowed only three antennas to be set up. It found the third antenna did not allow enough reading area. Adjustments were made to this antenna by changing its orientation and position to provide a greater reading area for the antenna. A fourth antenna has been added to ensure that a tag can be read regardless of its location on the pallet.
Example 4: International Paper (Automatic Reorders) In September 2004, International Paper signed an agreement with Globe Ranger’s iMotion Edgeware platform for RFID supply chain solutions. The company has recognized the importance of optimizing business processes using process and workflow man- agement to deliver user-defined business rules for immediate visibility and exception alerts. The customers will take advantage of the RFID technology to trigger reorders automatically when they move a roll of paper onto their own equipment to produce cartons or items.
Example 5: Unilever (Tag Location for Dishwashing Liquids)
Unilever found the shape and size of the product can affect the optimal location for tags on cases and pallets. It placed the tags at the top third of the case of dishwashing liquid bottles that taper at the top. This tapering feature of these bottles has allowed air space at the top of the cases where tags can experience less interference as it is known that tags do not work very well in close proximity to liquids.
Example 6: Procter & Gamble (Dock Loading Throughput) In 2001, Procter & Gamble in Spain experienced bottlenecks at the loading dock where forklift drivers would run out of room on the dock for stacking pallets to be shipped. To make room, pallets were moved twice or production stopped for the loading dock to be cleared. To save time, the company moved the pallets to the trucks from the dock. However, these pallets were some- times sent to the customers by mistake when they were supposed to reload back to the dock from the trucks.
To increase throughput and eliminate costly mistakes, Procter and Gamble developed an RFID-based system to identify the pallets. This has allowed the plant to shift to direct loading, increase the speed of loading, and reduce the number of forklift truck drivers needed.
Example 7: Major Clothier Retailer (Item-Level Consumer Tracking)
In the first major field test of RFID for consumer item-level track- ing, a major clothing retailer according to Texas Instruments showed how EPC-complaint RFID tags produced 99.9 percent inventory tracking accuracy in tests in distribution centers and boosted in-stock sales significantly compared with stores in the area not using RFID.
RFID readers were wired into shelves to alert store staff when any item became out-of-stock on the shelf so it could be replenished immediately. Other foreseeable benefits of RFID include assisting POS operations by allowing mass scanning at checkout and instantly processing returns, loss prevention, and loyalty discounts.
Example 8: Marks and Spencer (RFID versus Bar Codes for Perishables)
Marks and Spencer, one of Europe’s largest retailers, decided to move from bar codes to reusable RFID smart labels. The company is pioneering a very large RFID supply deployment with 3.5 million tags using EPC-compliant TI-RFID technology.
Fifty chilled food suppliers are linked or to be linked to more than 350 stores across the United Kingdom. This way, the com- pany can move perishable refrigerated foods more quickly and accurately through the supply from dispatch and sorting to pick- up and distribution. The system’s capital cost is less than 1/10 of the annual cost of using bar codes, reading food trays, dollies, and roll cages 83 percent faster at each point in the supply chain.
Example 9: Library and Textile Markets
The library market extends from the supply chain of publishing books, from raw materials or semi-finished parts to the delivery of books as finished products for the libraries to purchase to which RFID tags can be affixed. Likewise, the textile rental indus- try serves as an extension to the much larger supply chain of raw materials or semi-finished items to the delivery of garments for use in hospitals, labs, and other large enterprises that require daily laundry of garments in compliance with local, state, and standard-governing regulations. For both scenarios, the RFID technology keeps track of all processes from one primary supply chain to an extended supply chain. The technology works as long as there are no offending materials nearby.
RFID tags in finished products (e.g., library books) delivered to customers such as libraries may be reused as “library” tags. With these tags, the libraries have a choice of keeping some informa- tion (e.g., ISBN, title, author, publisher’s name and location), removing other information that the libraries do not need such as location of raw materials, and adding the check-in and check- out dates, the location of the books, and patron’s name.
Once a library receives the books it ordered or received from the returning patrons, the extended supply chain begins with the book checked in on a shelf after it is read by a RFID transponder nearby. The extended library chain ends with the book checked out when the product is delivered. At this point, the tag has been updated to show the date it was checked out, the date it is to be checked in, the location of checking in or out, the name of the borrower, the title, author, publisher, and date of the book, and other essential information to track the book in the library.
The book to be checked out is placed on a reading station to read and update the tag, say, inside the back cover without having the librarian open it. The station can read the tags inside the books stacked on the station platform simultaneously, as long as there are no offending materials nearby.
In existing libraries, RFID tags can co-exist with existing EM anti- theft systems. The RFID tags affixed to books should have enough memory and data to allow a librarian to track the process of loaning out books to patrons (with RFID reading station or portable reader), recording books returned by patrons (also with RFID reading station or portable reader), and placing them on the shelves mounted with a smart fixed RFID reader).
Now, let’s look at the textile market. The consumers, particularly the medical and hospital staff, for example, send bags of dirty things to a cleaning store or a control point to have tags sewed in the clothes, if not done before, and to begin the process of automatically updating information in the sewn-in tags on unsorted garment without opening the bags that the clothes have been checked in and sorted in preparation for loading.
At each stage of the garment handling process, the clothes are placed on the station platform to record the status of each pro- cess. At the final process new information is entered on the tags that clean clothes are ready to be checked out and sorted out before they get loaded onto a truck on its way to an intended destination. The retailer receiving them records the receipt and delivery of clothes on the tags, and the database is updated each time the tag information is read.
REFERENCES
1. Hoffman, Michael, Brian Cheung, and Douglas Peterson, “A Framework to Measure and Improve Your Virtual Prototyping Process, MSC Software at http://www.mscsoftware.com.
2. Various surveys conducted by Comp TIA at http://www.comptia.org.
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