• Investment World
• eWorld
• Brand Line
• Mentor
• Life
• Canvas
• Praxis
• Urban Pulse
• Brand Quest
• The New Manager

Stocks

• Quotes
• SE Diary
• Scoreboard
• Open-End Mutual Fund

Cross Currency

• Rates
  
  

Shipping

• Ports
  
  

Archives

• Yesterday
• Datewise
• Resources
• In Focus
• In Depth

Group Sites

• The Hindu
• The Hindu ePaper
• Business Line
• Business Line ePaper
• Sportstar
• Frontline
• The Hindu eBooks
• The Hindu Images

Raghu Dayal

RFID use can transform the supply chain.

Pay without delay and be on your way. - SHAJU JOHN

The first part of this article looked at areas where radio frequency identification (RFID) technology could be applied, including logistics and travel. In the second part here, we look at some other instances where RFID could make a difference.

Shot in the arm for pharma

RFID has the potential to tackle counterfeiting of products and is thus useful for drug manufacturers. Once products are RFID-tagged, pharmaceutical firms can identify the points of rupture in the supply chain where theft or counterfeiting occurs. This may be the ultimate cradle-to-grave accounting of drugs for pharma companies.

SAP Corporate Research started work in 1998 to generate SAP applications that can be deployed on intelligent devices. RFID technology from SAP aimed to authenticate drugs and offer protection against the introduction of counterfeit or fraudulently obtained drugs into the supply chain.

The RFID tag, which can be attached to or incorporated into a product, contains an antenna and a programmable memory chip to communicate wirelessly with an RFID reader, thereby allowing inventories of finished drugs and raw materials to be updated real time.

With emerging stringent international regulations such as the EU Food Law and US Bioterrorism Act, complete product visibility and traceability becomes a mandatory requirement for a safe global supply chain. In the US, pharmaceutical manufacturers are also moving to respond to mandates issued by the US Food and Drug Administration.

In Japan, Toyota and other manufacturers are applying cutting-edge RFID applications to manufacturing processes.

Smart shelves

The US courier and logistics giant UPS is working to standardise RFID technologies to come up with supply chain management (SCM) solutions for its customers at the global level.

The world's biggest retailer Walmart is pushing its suppliers to adopt RFID tagging; its aim is to use RFID to better track inventory, reduce the need for stock in warehouses, and reduce empty shelves in supermarkets.

Chip and tag makers talk of every item in a shop having a tag, enabling a consumer to just stroll out of a store with his goods and have them automatically charged to his credit card.

On the retail floor, the moment a customer takes a product from the shelf, `smart shelves' automatically order more.

Metro Group has integrated 20 suppliers' processes into its own supply chain and is automating its goods receiving process, with the aim of eliminating stock counting errors and improving customer satisfaction by avoiding "out of stock" and product expiration situations. It has rolled out RFID throughout its supply chain, using an RFID middleware solution based on the IBM WebSphere RFID Premises Server.

Pantaloon's experiment with RFID revealed that "recording of data became smooth at the inward and outward terminals".

At a retail outlet for fuel, customers can buy petrol without using cash or credit cards. All that a customer has to do is wave an RFID key fob near the petrol pump. A transponder recognises the customer's dedicated ID code and then automatically charges purchases to an existing credit or debit card. HPCL proposes to automate fuel disbursal at 300 retail outlets across India, and has invited bids from companies for supply and implementation of end-to-end retail outlet automation solutions.

To be concluded

(The author is former MD, Concor.)

More Stories on : Broadband | Retailing | Radio/TV | Supply Chain Management

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
IT's in the air

Copyright © 2006, The Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu Business Line