End-to-end real-time tracking capability enabled by RFID technology provides complete coverage, visibility and control over every aspect of logistics network. It strikes potential bottom line benefits by optimizing logistics performance through tracking shipments with accuracy, ensuring timely and safe delivery and enhanced utilization of logistics assets.
Automatic identification technologies were first introduced in 1960s to help logistics department to identify items or products in the supply chain. During various stages of its adoption, the Auto ID technology has evolved in different forms viz., barcodes, touch memory, multi-dimensional barcodes and an early version of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). The concept of RFID systems has been around since World War II when the British Royal Air Force (RAF) used the technology to identify friend and foe aircraft. Since then, new technology combined with today's demanding competitive environment has made RFID more attractive and thus increasingly being tested for the real world. Now that companies are learning about the potential, and the technology has had time to mature, the demand is rising for extensive use worldwide. In the recent years, RFID technology has grown to the extent that it facilitates connecting directly to physical products to logistics systems as a highly potential automatic ID technology. Before, we understand how RFID technology provides significant efficiency and cost-related benefits in logistics; we shall understand the concept of RFID technology.
RFID is a technology that incorporates the use of electromagnetic or electrostatic coupling in the Radio Frequency (RF) portion of the electromagnetic spectrum to uniquely identify an object, animal, or person. RFID technology provides an automatic way to collect asset data such as unique identification, location, transaction and time quickly, accurately and easily without requiring direct contact or line-of-sight scanning. It uses radio frequency communication to automatically identify, track and manage objects. A basic RFID system consists of three components:
Tag (or Transponder): An RFID tag can be categorized as either passive or active:
- Passive Tags: Relies on RF energy transferred from the reader to the tag to power the tag. These are typically short-range. Passive RFID is appropriate where the movement of tagged assets is highly consistent, with little or no requirement for security/sensing/data storage. |
