White Paper: RFID Goes Mainstream Thanks To Affordability, Flexibility

By George W. Everhart, CEO, Alien Technology

RFID customers now have a choice of vendors for hardware, tags, and services. In 2007, large customers started reaching out to solutions integrators to support sizable installations, moving projects from pilots to production. With industry standardization efforts (ISO and electronic product code [EPC] Gen 2), RFID became affordable. Tag prices dropped by 70%. Reader prices decreased by 50%, and today, reader/antenna solutions are available for less than $900. In two years, UHF RFID reliability has increased by 300%, and manufacturing quality has improved from 80% to 99.5%. Additionally, RFID now enjoys industry support from such large Fortune 100 businesses as IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and SAP.

RFID technology has matured to deliver solutions to businesses while also overcoming tagging obstacles such as those presented by metals and liquids, opening access to new segments and applications. In addition, increased sensitivity and read range of RFID integrated circuits, coupled with improved software and functionality of the readers to control read zones, are paving the way for the entry of UHF RFID into airline baggage handling and item-level solutions for the pharmaceutical industry. Beyond its expected entry into the airline and pharmaceutical industries, this year RFID will start providing a realistic solution to fight counterfeit products on a global scale.

Used with permission from Integrated Solutions magazine.