Group completes new RFID technology standards

Radio frequency identification (RFID) standards group EPCglobal has finalised its first global standards, promising to help speed companies' adoption of RFID technologies to improve supply chain operations.

The electronic product code (EPC) technologies standards define the types of tags to be used and the frequencies the tags work at, as well as the tag read rates, according to EPCglobal spokesman, Jack Grasso.

There has been a push for product suppliers and retailers to adopt RFID technologies recently, under the premise that companies will be able to improve the efficiency and transparency of their supply chains. The technology is implemented through tags placed on product cases and pallets, which contain an RFID chip with a small antenna that emits a unique product identifier code when passed near an RFID reader. That information is then transmitted to an inventory control system. Retail heavyweight Wal-Mart Stores put a wave of RFID adoption in motion by issuing a mandate last year that its top 100 suppliers begin using electronic product codes by January 2005. Wal-Mart has already began trials of the technologies in a regional distribution center and several stores in Texas.

As a member of EPCglobal, Wal-Mart had implemented the new protocols in its trial, Grasso said.

Though RFID has been lauded as the future of supply chain management, a few factors have impeded wide adoption: the nascency of the technology, the expense of buying and testing RFID systems, and the lack of global RFID standards.

Grasso acknowledged that the new protocols did not solve all the problems in creating a global standards for RFID technologies.

However, he said: "It's an evolutionary process. This is the first set of formal standards and others will follow."

In fact, EPCglobal has begun creating standards for the next generation of tag specifications called UHF (ultra high frequency) Gen 2. "Gen 2 will broaden the spectrum of usage of tags," Grasso said.

EPCglobal said it would soon provide its subscribers with access to equipment interoperability tests and offer other compliance services later this year.

The not-for-profit group is a joint venture between EAN International and Uniform Code Council and counts as members other major retailers such as Gillette and Procter & Gamble.

Companies that want to implement the standards must become EPCglobal subscribers, and the price of becoming a subscriber depends on a company's revenue and number of EPC codes it plans to use, according to Grasso.

The group currently had more than 200 subscribers, the majority of which were large corporations, he said.

A survey released by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, ePC Group and Retail Systems Alert Group earlier this year indicated that 70 per cent of large companies with at least $US5 billion in annual sales will begin RFID timelines and initiatives within the next 18 months, and 25 per cent of those will spend between $US500,000 and $US10 million on RFID adoption in 2004.