RFid Blog

$750m is the amount that global airline industry spends every year. You would be surprised to know that the amount is spent as compensation for baggage theft and mishandling at airports.

The main reason of baggage theft can be attributed to outdated barcode technology. Realizing this, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has quite long decided to introduce RFID tags for airline asset tracking.

Denver, CO - RFID LTD has marched a step ahead in this regard. The company has launched its ‘BagChip‘ program that uses RFID technology to assist the airlines to track the baggage. A number of airlines including Delta Airlines, AMEX Airline Index are currently using the Denver RFID system.

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No more security lapses in the Marion County Juvenile Detention Center located in Indianapolis. The inmates from here are now under full scanner. Any effort to breach the security will be dealt with swiftly. This is possible due to the introduction of RFID enabled inmate tracking system.

The Juvenile Detention Center, which shelters nearly 200 male and female offenders, is going to adopt a WiFi compatible TSI PRISM RFID inmate tracking system from Alanco Technologies.

The bbwexchange magazine reports that the TSI PRISM software would be integrated with the Marion County Juvenile facility’s Quest operating system to enhance continual flow of data from a central intake point as each youth is kept in custody and registered into the facility.

The deployment of RFID system will cost around $650,000 including design services and staff training. The Detention center is likely to start the RFID program next month.

Recognizing potentialities of RFID technology, US Nissan has been deploying WhereNet active RFID and real-time locating system (RTLS) technology at its 4-million-square-foot assembly plant in Canton, Mississippi.

It would strength inbound supply chain and outbound chain of Canton manufacturing unit, which produces more than 400,000 vehicles yearly including the Altima sedan, Armada full-size sport utility vehicle, Infiniti QX56 full-size sport utility vehicle, Quest minivan and Titan full-size pickup truck.

As part of the RFID program, Nissan will use a single wireless architecture to operate multiple WhereNet applications such as WhereSoft, Yard Management System and Vehicle Tracking and Management System to enhance production velocity, labor productivity and vehicle quality.

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UK Visa has decided to launch contactless ‘wave and pay’ debit cards that would replace low-value cash transactions by end of 2007.

The introduction of RFID enables Contactless debit cards would speed up the monetary transactions. For instance, if a consumer wants to make a payment for the low value transactions like coffee and newspapers (less than 10 pounds), then he can wave his debit card over a reader without signing a receipt or enter a PIN number.

Besides it, the wave and pay system could be helpful for other remote payments like vending machines, road tolls or parking meters.

Visa has already discussed with its members banks for the rollout of new debit card systems. Initially, this system would be introduced in London and spread through out the UK by the end of next year.

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Do not wait for the waiter to order your favorite dish. Simply press the item listed in the menu. Within a few minutes, you would find your favorite dish at the table. This is possible due to the introduction of RFID technology.

The SK (South Korea) Telecom has developed a similar type of application using RFID technology. The SK Telecom has demonstrated it during the RFID/USN KOREA 2006.

Called as U-Fast Food, the system of ordering fast food is very simple and effective. You just scan an RFID tag attached to the menu as shown in the above picture and pay for it via your cell phone. In this way, you can get better service without depending upon others.

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Hong Kong Disneyland, the fifth Disneyland in the world has introduced an RFID-enabled fingerprint scanning technology, which would protect its customers’ fingerprint data and privacy in a simple process.

The biometric ticket system, which carries RFID tags, takes 50 points of a fingerprint stored in a numerical value. Then it runs the number through an algorithm and adds encryption to it.

The advanced ticketing system also identifies physiological data beneath the finger to monitor blood flow and cartilages to expose the prosthetic or fake fingers to get into.

David Shek, senior analyst of IT security, Hong Kong Disneyland said,

We didn’t want to take the customers’ entire fingerprint [image] and have to implement a security structure to properly protect that data.

With the introduction biometric ticket system in the Hong Kong Disneyland, the annual pass holders are now not required to produce photo ID card to authenticate their identity while entering into the theme park.

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Even though, the debate regarding the loopholes of RFID continues to haunt the European countries, the future of this latest technology is very bright in the continent. The business enterprises and retailers still consider RFID as the most effective technology to strength their brand security by protecting them from counterfeiting.

Particularly, the use of RFID technology in the retail sector would be intensified in the next few years. As projected by RNCOS, the retailer spending on RFID technology would exceed US$315.6 million by 2009. While, healthcare units will make a huge investment on RFID technology (nearly US$ 408 Million), followed by mass transportation with a investment of US$ 371.3 Million in 2009.

In its recent report, ‘RFID Industry Analysis 2006‘, the research firm RNCOS predicted Sales of RFID systems in Western Europe are likely to reach near about US$ 1.9 Billion by the year 2009 from US$ 1.1 Billion in 2007. Germany and U.K., which constitute 40% of the RFID market in Western Europe at present, will maintain the same market share in 2009.

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Thailand is emerging as the one of the potential markets for RFID technology in Asia since it is the manufacturing base for many industries.

The country is implementing this technology in number of fields such as supply chain management, manufacturing and logistics taking RFID to a new high.

Last year, the RFID market in Thailand was worth $16.3 million. It is on its way to become a $32 million business by the end of 2010. The double growth is mainly due to increasing use in manufacturing and logistics application, a Frost and Sullivan report predicted.

The report entitled ‘Thailand RFID Markets’ studied the RFID market for security and access control, manufacturing and logistics, transportation, animal tracking, and others.

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Two leading chipmakers Sony and NXP Semiconductors have signed an MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) to form a joint venture for the development of an Integrated Circuit(IC) for the RFID-based Near Filed Communication (NFC).

The MoU brings NXP’s Mifare technology and Sony’s FeliCa Platform of a single chip for the formation of IC.

The Integrated Chip would immensely benefit the NFC applications like contactless payments, smart cards such as Oyster card that is being used for making payments in the London’s Underground subway or Hong Kong’s Octopus mass-transit card. The joint venture targets Asian and European markets.

RFID Journal has the full coverage

It’s victory of Impinj and also victory of RFID technology as the company proved that RFID tags are perfect for item-level tagging in the pharmaceutical sector.

The packager Owens-Illinois (O-I) and Impinj claimed RFID tagging on an item-level for pharmaceuticals is 100 percent reliable.

The RFID Health Care Industry Adoption Summit, which was held in Washington, carried out two major demonstrations on applicability of RFID technology. The demonstrations used a near-field ultrahigh frequency (UHF) Gen 2 RFID solution consisting of readers and chips from Impinj and item-level embedded RFID tags from I-O. The summit concluded that Impinj readers are perfect for healthcare units.