Evening Session: Diane Bostick, Senior Account Executive, and Scott Pugh, Systems Engineer from Intermec Technologies, a leader in emerging RFID technology, presented an update and technology overview - including the current status on Standards, Intermec hardware solutions and system requirements to consider, including Intermec case studies in current use.

What's all the excitement about RFID?
RFID, (Radio Frequency Identification), in conjunction with systems for Auto ID (Automatic Identification), are not new systems. But since the 1970s have been far too expensive for a business case. RFID and Auto ID provide a new way to do something we have always done, counting things. A small chip in a tag is read by radio waves, which means you don't need the line of sight used in barcodes. The chip can be Read/Write and can contain several Kilobytes of data to identify people and objects. You need thousands of chips, new readers, and software to handle lots of data.

How will/can it fit in our multivalue world?
Business Case: The technology has become significantly more affordable, but it is still expensive. And the business case scenario has changed significantly. Now your biggest customers are requiring you to implement RFID systems. The standards are not complete. The supply of hardware and software is changing rapidly. It will take more than six months to get the system implemented if you know what you are doing. And your biggest customer has said you have to be running the technology in 6 months.
Are you ready to: 1. come up with a business case? 2. request the funds? 3. understand physics?