The Hindu Business Line : Microsoft India centre working on RFID project

CODE-NAMED Qubani - after the Hyderabad dessert Qubani-ka-meetha - a project is under way at Microsoft India Development Centre (MIDC), Hyderabad. A team of developers is working on the project that aims to push Microsoft's presence in RFID (radio frequency identification), according to a company official.

The MIDC-incubated Microsoft's RFID product is likely to be released in the third or fourth quarter of this year.

For the first time, the India centre would release an incubated (right from scratch) product for the global market, Mr Anush Kumar, Programme Manager, MIDC, told Business Line in an e-mail response.

So far, the India centre has been collaborating with Microsoft's headquarters in Redmond, US on various projects and solutions. There are other products that have been built and shipped out of MIDC beginning from Services for UNIX and Microsoft VJ#, he said.

RFID is an automatic identification method that relies on storing and remotely retrieving data using devices called RFID tags or transponders.

Every element of the RFID project is being done out of Hyderabad. A team of professionals at MIDC worked on the early version of the platform.

The team has the complete responsibility of taking Microsoft successfully into RFID. Microsoft expects the team to grow considerably in size as development picks up momentum, Mr Kumar said.

Microsoft's RFID technology is built on top of the .Net framework. According to Mr Kumar, RFID is in the early stages of adoption but Microsoft sees the potential of this technology that will enhance control of key business processes to increase business performance and enhance customer service for manufacturers, distributors, retailers and other industries.

Microsoft RFID adapters will help to easily integrate the back-end applications with one another. The MIDC group will provide a single set of adapters for enterprise application integration, business intelligence and data warehousing, according to information available at the MIDC Web site.