RFID: Simple Concept Hobbled by Daunting Complexity

A well written article excerpted from NYTimes by CRM Buyerabout RFID - I would think that anyone knowing about RFID - observing at a distance RFID,- Simple Concept Hobbled By Daunting Complexity Excerpts:

Like investing or hitting a tennis ball, using radio scanners to wirelessly identify consumer products seems simple in concept, but in reality, it is dauntingly complex.The biggest challenge for retailers and their suppliers has been melding the building blocks of RFID into systems that are reliable without being cumbersome or unduly expensive. Unlike the RFID systems that automatically collect tolls from motorists or control access to buildings, those designed for commerce call for disposable, batteryless tags that are tiny and unobtrusive. And since the tags are meant to be slapped on every pallet or carton or even on every item, they must be cheap enough for businesses to buy them by the hundreds of millions.

The ultimate goal of an RFID system is to track individual products all the way from manufacture to sale. Under such a system, every item would have a tag embedded in its label or attached separately. The tag consists of a microchip and a flat ribbon of antenna; the microchip would contain a unique code identifying the manufacturer, type of product and individual serial number.As the item moved through the supply chain, scanners in doorways, on loading docks or at other handoff points would capture the movement. Radio waves from the scanners would be picked up by the tag's antenna, providing energy for the tag to broadcast its identity back to the scanner.Data would flow through the Internet or other networks to corporate computers, but if the tags had read-write capability, status updates on the item could be added to the tag as well. Once products reached the store, scanners in the stockroom could track how rapidly they are moved to shelves, and scanners on shelves could monitor when shoppers removed them. Finally, a checkout scanner could ring up everything in a shopping cart as it was wheeled toward the door.