Jacqueline Emigh

RFID carries both promise and pitfalls, and there are alternative supply chain technologies that can do a better job in many circumstances, IT vendors told the Federal Communications Commission during an all-day RFID Workshop on Thursday. Further, how RFID is implemented will vary according to the application, said some of speakers at the event, held […]

Its been a busy week in the supply chain arena for Unisys, who not only has rolled out a series of supply chain solutions for retail, life sciences, consumer product goods and transportation markets, but has also announced deals with supply chain specialists Proforma and Manugistics Inc. and longtime partners Microsoft Corp. and Oracle Corp. […]

Has RFID been overly hyped? Most speakers agreed that the answer is “yes” during a panel discussion Tuesday in New York City that looked at the roles government and private industry can play in protecting the global supply chain from terrorism and theft. Joseph McGrath, president and chief operating officer at Unisys Corp., suggested that […]

OAT Foundation Suite 4.0, an RFID software product introduced at this weeks EPCglobal show, meets industry analysts definitions of both an RFID framework and RFID middleware, according to officials at OATSystems. The company also announced deals with Hewlett-Packard Co. and United Kingdom-based retailing giant Tesco Plc. at the show in Baltimore. Marc Osofsky, vice president […]

At the EPCglobal show on Tuesday, Microsoft announced an RFID customer pilot with snack-food maker Jack Links Beef Jerky, a product supplier to Wal-Mart, Target and the U.S. Department of Defense. The company says the pilot is part of its plan to target its RFID offerings at SMBs (small to midsized businesses). Large turnkey players […]

After setting up an initial RFID test center in Dallas last May, Sun Microsystems Inc. will follow up with a similar facility somewhere in Scotland, said Vijay Sarathy, group marketing manager for RFID at Sun. Sarathy said he sees large systems integrationists such as IBM and Hewlett-Packard Co. as Suns competitors in RFID. But middleware […]

RFID standards will be an informal theme at this weeks EPCglobal show in Baltimore, if early news of new products and partnerships is any indication. Enterprise resource planning software giant SAP AG and security specialist VeriSign Inc. are among the companies expected to announce plans involving RFID standards. SAP will unveil a new initiative with […]

Hewlett-Packard Co., one of the “initial eight” product distributors in the Wal-Mart RFID trials, will unveil on Monday pacts with systems integrator BearingPoint Inc. and RFID software specialist OATSystems Inc. The moves signal big changes in HPs strategy as an RFID vendor, according to Frank Lanza, worldwide director of RFID for HP Services. Under the […]

Many organizations are trying to get ready for RFID, even if theyre not sure all the technology is in place to support it, results of a new survey suggest. The concerns that users express in the survey— costs, an early and untested market, standards, and lack of sophisticated integration software—mesh with some of the observations […]

Despite its large potential, RFID still faces huge hurdles. Standardization, costs and privacy are generally the steepest, said speakers at this weeks Maritime Security Expo in New York City. Another issue, particularly crucial in government anti-terrorism circles, is that RFID doesnt show with any certainty “whats inside the box.” In fact, RFID (radio frequency identification) […]