Subject: [NEXTEL-1] More RFID Dribble- Wireless Tracking: Out of the Shadows

From: Marcelrf <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2004 00:50:13 -0500

More RFID Dribble- Wireless Tracking: Out of the Shadows

By Mark Long
Wireless NewsFactor

February 24, 2004

The technologies for wirelessly tracking the location and status
of goods, vehicles and even individuals have been around for
quite a while without gaining a great deal of marketplace traction.
Two years ago, when the U.S. slid into an economic tailspin, it
was no longer enough for Radio Frequency Identification technology
to be cool; RFID tags also had to show business managers how they
could generate a cool profit for the company.

Executives from major companies -- such as Wal-Mart -- became
believers last year, after participating in pilot projects that
demonstrated
how RFID tags could help them achieve substantial reductions in their
supply-chain costs.

"By January of 2005, Wal-Mart's top 100 suppliers must ship to
Wal-Mart's
Texas distribution center and stores with RFID tags on all cases and
pallets," says Yankee Group senior analyst Mike Dominy. "The U.S.
government
(namely, the Department of Defense) also has a January 2005 mandate
requiring their suppliers to ship cases and pallets with RFID tags as
well."

An Expanding Market

Today, RFID is just a US$200 million market, including the tags,
readers,
database software and related consulting services.

"The price of RFID tags is currently in the 40-to-60-cent range, and so
the
cost of putting them on every single case to be shipped is substantial,"
Dominy told NewsFactor. "Therefore, the efficiencies that can be
obtained
through their use may not, in many cases, offset their cost -- at least
right now."

However, the Yankee Group projects market growth to $1 billion by the
end of
2004 and a global market of just over $4 billion by 2008.

"This is assuming that the price of tags will continue to fall, because
that's expected to be the single biggest driver of future growth,"
Dominy
noted. "And this is just what we fully expect will happen. If not, then
[the] overall market will be delayed."

Mixing RF with Analytics

"The wireless-tracking breakthroughs that we are seeing right now all
have
to do with what can be done over the Internet. As the cost of RFID tags
[goes] down, these kinds of things will become affordable for more
companies," notes Forrester Research vice president Navi Radjou.

"But the real revolution has to do with what's happening within the
infrastructure itself -- in what one can actually do with the data. This
is
what will eventually make or break many companies that are working in
this
area," Radjou told NewsFactor.

"When it comes to the use of remote diagnostic systems that leverage
wireless-tracking technologies, we expect 10 billion devices will be
connected by 2010," predicts Radjou. "You can see how this can happen
just
by looking at the huge amount of goods that will get shipped by large
organizations, such as Wal-Mart and the Department of Defense," he
added.

Delta Airlines already is using predictive analytics from a company
called
SmartSignal (See http://www.smartsignal.com) that allows them to collect
telemetry data wirelessly from the engines of their planes while taking
off,
climbing and cruising.

According to a recent study from the National Science Foundation (See
http://www.nsf.gov/), an airline company deploying remote diagnostic
systems
that leverage wireless-tracking capabilities should be able to save 51
percent on overall maintenance costs.

"This will also prove to be the case for any other type of company with
a
lot of assets of a similar nature," Radjou said.

An Internet with Wings

Another long-anticipated use of wireless-tracking technology is less
down to
earth. Lufthansa, Scandinavian Airlines System and Japan Airlines have
signed up for a new service called "Connexion by Boeing" that will use
capacity on the global Intelsat satellite system, beginning this spring,
to
provide notebook-toting airline passengers with broadband Internet
access
during flights.

Each participating aircraft will be equipped with four 1-Mbps satellite
modems, only one of which is needed to handle the e-mail transmissions
and
Web-browser requests of passengers.

"There's a lot of computing going on in each aircraft anyway, but right
now
it is only when an airplane reaches the ground that aircraft maintenance
can
get their hands on the data recorder and analyze the information to
determine if maintenance will be required," said Connexion by Boeing
spokesperson Sean Griffin.

If the flight data indicates that a plane needs to be serviced, it takes
time to find a mechanic, order the right parts, and then wait for all of
it
to come together. Meanwhile, the plane and its passengers are waiting to
take off.

"If the same data could be transmitted to the destination while the
plane is
still in the air, then the spare parts and mechanic could be ready to go
as
soon as the plane rolls into the gate," Griffin told NewsFactor. "What
we
will be doing is providing the airlines with a fat bandwidth pipe that
they
can use for a variety of applications to improve the operational
efficiencies of their airlines. The rest will be up to them."

Enhancing Homeland Security

Recent U.S. government initiatives pertaining to homeland defense and
automobile safety also will be driving demand for RFID and related
wireless-tracking gear in the months and years ahead.

"The Bio-Terrorism Act of 2002 will basically force all the chemical and
pharmaceutical companies to track what is happening with their tanker
shipments," notes Dominy. "And under the Container Security Initiative,
U.S.
Customs will be forcing American companies importing from abroad to
begin
tracking all their incoming containers." he added.

On the downside, metal and liquids can interfere with the transmission
of RF
from the tags to the readers. Therefore, manual processes or additional
RFID
tags must be applied to products containing liquids or metal, because
those
materials either will absorb or reflect the RF.

"The tags only communicate over a limited distance of about a couple of
feet," explained Dominy.

Eventually, however, he expects to see advanced RFID tags that will be
able
to monitor the seals on containers and truck-trailer doors. If someone
breaches the seal on a container, the tag will be capable of
communicating
with the vehicle's GPS unit, alerting security personnel to investigate.

Stay Tuned for Part 2: Telematics, E911 and Location-Based Marketing

http://wireless.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_title=Wireless_Tracking__Out_of_the_Shadows&story_id=23232&category=gps

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