The World of RFID What do you think???

1. The World of RFIDWhat do you think??? Video

2. Presentation on RFID Presented By: BuckleUpBaby Ashley Morris, Christina Saechao, & Katie Smith

3. Concept Map

4. Who is Edelweiss??? • An Armed Forces Recreation Center (AFRC) • Vacation destination designed especially for military personnel • Located in Garmisch, Germany • Newly opened in September 2004 • Services a resort complete with 2 mountain ski resorts • Vacation Village, Conference Centers, & Guided Tours • Complete with all of the comforts and amenities of a world-class resort • Broad collection of recreation, entertainment, fitness, dining, beverage and hospitality services • Services up to 300,000 guests per year  • One of the most desirable destinations in the Bavarian Alps and Germany's premiere winter and summer sports center

5. Problems Encounter occasional problems • Tracking equipment and loss prevention • What steps are required for the implementation of RFID chips? • What expected ranges could be expect to cover (say for instance we need to track our transportation, which travels to and from Munich)? • How much does the implementation cost? • Who provides RFID implementation and maintenance? • In the case of use with ski badges, avalanche rescue, and other events; what kind of durability can we expect?

6. Research Strategy & Organization • Read about Edelweiss to become familiar with their company and needs • General search of RFID to become experts on this topic • Used questions from Edelweiss to form and narrow down our search • Generated a reading list covering major topics • Reading list is logically organized by grouping readings from several different areas we felt fit into certain categories to provide a general idea of what RFID is, how certain companies use it and how it can potentially be used, how and what to consider when considering implementation, and some more general concerns that RFID creates for everyone.  We hope this generally provides you with an intellectual basis of RFID and a better sense of where to look to find information that is relevant and of good quality. • Verified sources to check credibility • Used professional journals, government websites, and non biased organizations

7. Difficulties • People feel that reviewing information from companies who supply RFID is unreliable, for they are biased. We feel that the information may be biased, but it is reliable because they specialize in RFID and are knowledgeable. • Generalized costs – Not specific • Quantifying how good the information was – How to decide what was good and what was not • Finding information on RFID related to this company and the uses that they desired • More related to retail • Very new and evolving; New developments • Quirks being worked out and regulated • Implementation typically large scaled - requiring top management and lots of analysis • Specific information is not readily available • Talking to a sales person would be informative • Information from person to person varies

8. RFID Overview RFID • Provides real-life examples of companies who are using it • Shows a magnitude of the many possibilities of RFID

9. Frequency • Active tags: • Has its own power source (usually a battery) • Can be read up to 100 feet away • Commonly used for toll road collections and tracking hospital equipment, railcars, and other valuable assets • Bulky and expensive; not used for retail items • Passive tags: • Used in libraries and retail establishments • Contain no internal power source (battery) • Powered by signals generated by readers • Advantages: less expensive, smaller and thinner, without a battery they have a longer life

10. Frequency Cont. • Read range: The distance from which a tag can be read • Depends on a number of factors: • Frequency of radio waves used for tag-reader communication • Size of tag antenna • Power output of the reader • Whether tags have a battery to broadcast a signal or gather energy from a reader or merely reflect a weak signal back to the reader • Battery-powered tags typically have a read range of 300 feet • If tags are attached to products with water or metal, the read range can be significantly less • If the size of the antenna is reduced, the read range will be reduced • Increasing the power output could increase the range • Governments restrict the output of readers so that they don't interfere with other RF devices (cordless phones)

11. Durability • Integrity needs to be maintained prior to, during, and after application • Implement carefully controlled handling techniques and storage procedures • Withstand an extraordinary amount of abuse • Endure being stomped on or run over by forklifts • Harsh environments (Snow, rain, and sunlight) • Dirty environments (Dirt, dust, moisture, and oil) • Can be read through a variety of substances • Snow, fog, ice, paint, crusted grime and other visually and environmentally challenging conditions • Detection distances may be reduced • Tags will last for decades • Prone to scratching and tearing

12. Costs Adopting to RFID……. • Investments in tags, printer/encoders, readers, middleware, and professional Services • If w/o current bar-coding, also invest in back-office manufacturing and a system to use RFID data • According to Forrester Research the typical supplier that attempts to comply with a mandate can expect to spend as much as $9 million RFID. This figure can increase of decrease depending on the size of the distribution network. • Tags make up around 80% of costs and are not decreasing anytime soon. Professional services run high and the cost will only increase

13. Costs Broken Down • Tags: $ 7.6 Million • Biggest investment • Variable cost (Tag price around 40 cents per item) • Hardware: $329,000 • Includes both servers and readers • Software, box, antennas, cabling, power and installation: $8-10,000 • Basically everything needed to make RFID fully serviceable • Middleware: $183,000 • Manages the readers and the database to contain the EPC codes • Consulting and integration: $128,000 • Based on an hourly rate of $250 for an RF engineer • High rate due to demand in market and few people know how to implement this right now • Internal Project team: $315,000 • Full and part time resources, IT and logistics, customer services associates, packaging and finance • Tags reader testing: $80,000 • Additional warehouse labor: around $500,000 • Includes costs for the time it took to apply tags to ship • 2-3 people a shift • Including the cost of $39,000 for new and existing employees

14. Who Provides RFID • Subscribe to RFID Journal • “Request a Quote” • Searches over 500 vendors without commission • Precision Dynamics Corporation – Identification wrist bands • http://209.85.141.104/search?q=cache:fhRVZNqg0vIJ:www.dag-access.com/+rfid+vendors+ski+resort&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=9&gl=us

16. RFID Pros/Cons

17. Recommendations • At this time, we do not recommend RFID implementation for your company. • New and Changing  High Price • Doesn’t properly fit your company • More commonly used in retail industry for tracking and loss prevention • Depending on your funding, RFID could be beneficial to your company.