Next time technology entrepreneur Carlos Johnson comes calling at Cavalli Club in Dubai, he will be greeted by name and escorted to the preferred corner table without him having to prove his identity at the door.

Johnson would be able to avail of such personalised services, including getting his favourite drink even without having to order, as the Club’s hostess already knows of his arrival and preferences by tapping into a system powered by Mumbai-based Essen RFID.

Radio frequency ID

Cavalli Club, a brainchild of Italian design maestro Roberto Cavalli, will be upping the hospitality quotient for its uber-rich guests by deploying radio frequency identification or RFID-enabled membership cards with built-in tags for near field communication (NFC) from Essen.

“When a guest comes within 100 metres of Cavalli Club, the management will be intimated on their handheld devices through readers so that they can personalise services for their patrons, some of whom end up spending over $20,000 every night,” said Apurva Parekh, Chief Executive Officer of the privately-held Essen RFID.

The service, which is being deployed through 1Platinum Concierge and Dubai-based Waypoint Systems, has already been tested and is currently being fine-tuned, Parekh added.

Expensive club

Cavalli Club was established in 2009 with an estimated investment of $30 million. It is said to be one of the most extravagant and expensive clubs in the UAE. Celebrities such as Akon, Jennifer Lopez, Mike Tyson, Boy George and others have been spotted at the club. In 2012, a bill which came to over $105,000 went viral as the customers just ordered drinks but did not order anything to eat.

On the other hand, Essen is an original equipment maker with RFID deployments across India, West Asia and Africa. Established in 1978, the company provides the hardware, tags, middleware and application for asset tracking and personnel tracking.

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