News | July 24, 2007

RFID Center: HP Opens European RFID Solutions Center

Hewlett Packard, together with Intel, Microsoft and the School of Management and the Department of Electronics and Information of the Polytechnic of Milan, founded the RFID Solutions Center in Milan, Italy. The company has been also designated a strategic RFID technology provider to Euro Pool System, the No. 1 provider of returnable packing for fresh products in Europe.

The new center is designed to spur RFID (radio frequency identification) adoption by providing HP partners and customers with access to RFID innovations and resources to develop and test integrated solutions, host projects in a single, secure environment, and share technical knowledge more easily.

RFID is a data collection technology that provides suppliers, retailers, manufacturers and distributors with up-to-the-minute supply chain visibility, from inventory and logistics to freshness dates. Such timely supply chain information enables companies to track products and services, increase stock availability, reduce shrinkage and ultimately improve business outcomes.

"The opening of the HP RFID Solutions Center is a milestone in driving widespread RFID adoption," said Frank Lanza, worldwide RFID director, HP. "By integrating innovative RFID solutions throughout the entire business process cycle, HP can help customers gain improved visibility into their infrastructures to respond rapidly to business demands, mitigate risk and lower costs."

The HP RFID Solutions Center also is intended to anticipate new customer requirements and employ its research and development capabilities to bring solutions to market. Key services at the facility include:

  • Integration Center – Partners can test and integrate HP technologies to develop comprehensive solutions.
  • Project Hosting – A single, secure environment enables the development and testing of a multitude of RFID projects.
  • Demo Lab – HP customers and partners use demo areas to collaborate on new services and learn about implementations in specific industries.
  • Training Center – Internal HP staff, customers and partners convene to exchange technical knowledge.

HP extends customer base with Euro Pool System Euro Pool System depends on a supply chain that can deliver a competitive edge in a high-volume environment. The company delivers hundreds of orders every day to and from various countries in Europe and owns more than 88 million containers that rotate at a minimum of 414 million times per year. Euro Pool System required an RFID solution that could automatically track its products, in real time, from the manufacturing plant to the cash register.

"As the No. 1 provider of returnable packaging in Europe, our business advantage is measured in the accuracy of our supply chain," said Henry Lok, manager of research and development, Euro Pool System. "We trust HP as our RFID provider, not only for their expertise honed through internal best practices, but because they understand how each step in our business process is tied to a much greater goal – and which technologies will help get us there."

HP worked with Euro Pool System to meet demanding requirements, such as the ability to read RFID tags in environments with high-pressure water and dust, in order to accommodate daily deliveries by waterways, road and rail. Aiding Euro Pool System in the design of the solution were HP architects and technical resources from the HP RFID Solutions Center, where the application was tested.

The solution also speeds the reconciliation process and benchmark performance across Generation 2, or "Gen 2," readers. Gen 2 technology supersedes first generation RFID systems and can read and write significantly more tags per second with higher reliability in tag counting, enhanced security and extensibility to higher-function tags and systems.

HP's expertise enabled Euro Pool System to deploy an RFID Gen 2 technology-based solution without the usual challenges sometimes associated with the newer technology, such as the disruption of ongoing operations.

HP Services professionals and expertise from the HP RFID Solution Center in Milan enabled Euro Pool System to overcome those challenges and achieve the following key benefits:

  • Ability to read 300-plus tags per crate with 100 percent accuracy;
  • Increased visibility and crate management across its extended supply chain;
  • Improved claims handling from all constituents;
  • Integrated data with back-end systems to obtain necessary financial information; and
  • Cost savings from claims, deposits and reconciliation processes with retailers and growers.

HP used the native RFID component inside Microsoft's new BizTalk Server 2006 R2 as a key software platform for the solution. Microsoft's RFID technology provided the bridge between the RFID systems and the Euro Pool System business applications, and it helped enable additional cost savings in the solution.

HP also partnered with ADT, which is part of Tyco International and has a strong track record in electronic security and tagging and significant experience in RFID. ADT provided RFID reader hardware, reader deployment services and system performance tuning services to Euro Pool System. ADT's EPCglobal-accredited European RFID Performance Lab served as the hub for the development of a solution that could continually read more than 300 tags on a pallet in one pass through the RFID portal. ADT also provided device management solutions that will help the Euro Pool System project scale up over time.

HP and RFID

HP's expertise in RFID is multi-faceted: The company produces RFID-enabled retail goods, provides RFID consulting and integration services, participates in global RFID standards development and was an early adopter of RFID in its own operations.

The company has extensive experience in RFID projects with retailers around the world and uses RFID technologies internally with nearly 30 manufacturing sites tagging more than 100 HP products, including printers, scanners and servers.

More information about HP RFID solutions is available at h20223.www2.hp.com/NonStopComputing/cache/51817-0-0-225-121.aspx.

About HP
HP focuses on simplifying technology experiences for all of its customers – from individual consumers to the largest businesses. With a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure, HP is among the world's largest IT companies, with revenue totaling $97.1B for the four fiscal quarters ended April 30, 2007. More information about HP is available at www.hp.com.

SOURCE: HP