Category: RFID Industry

All blog posts

RAIN Man’s Letter to Santa, 2017

Dec 23, 2017

About the author

16Juho Partanen

I enjoy seeing both the Voyantic employees and our customers thrive. The grand majority of my time goes into projects and initiatives that grow the RAIN RFID market in the long term. My remote office is on a boat on the archipelago of Finland.

Content

Dear Santa,

I saw you at the shopping mall just the other day but you were occupied with other business, so I left you alone. I’ll give you ten points for the impressive entourage!

How has year 2017 been for you? Good funnel and outlook for 2018, or is that still too far away to say?

Me? Thanks, family is good, the dog and the house as well. However, as the next year is again just around the corner, I really wanted to write you this letter from the RAIN man’s perspective.

Please Help Retain the Talents

Both in your organization and ours it’s only natural that people come and go. I mean, it must be hard for your little helpers to keep those huge inventories accurate and muscle around all the odd-shaped packages, such as pianos and snowmobiles! Some of them surely get tired and steer their careers towards less seasonal operations. It’s the same at our end, with the difference ours is a little less seasonal and our helpers are taller than yours. The mileage is rough for both.

Talent pool in the RAIN business is still scarce, and it takes time to train the new superheroes. With that said, as we both need to keep our operations efficient and scalable, I would very much hope for two things:

  1. Keep the best talent motivated, committed and in-house
  2. Endorse standard procedures (or de-facto standard, as your chimney entrance)

Please Just Give Us One Name to Work With

Radio Frequency Identification went by the name RFID for a long while, but it seems we’ve run out of space under the same umbrella with so many very different technologies: LF, HF and UHF. First came NFC Forum and rebranded a hefty part of the portfolio. After a while RAIN Alliance was established to nurture UHF RFID under a new brand, RAIN. However, not all the stakeholders got onboard the RAIN train, which means plenty of branding confusion especially in the retail-domain, where EPC numbering brand by GS1 further complicates communication.

Please, let there be light, co-operation and goodwill among all the stakeholders, and show them the way. We saw GS1 and RAIN shake hands already in Lille in February 2017, they should just get the puzzle finally completed:

Please Supply RAIN Smartphones for Teenagers

Many seasoned RAIN-believers start to attract shades of gray at their temples. I’ve recently been told I’m among them. It’s not that we wouldn’t be as bright and innovative as always, but the youngsters think and act differently.
I’d like to see teenagers inject some craziness into our industry.

After a decade of waiting, could you finally come up with a reasonably priced RAIN enabled smartphone with fair battery capacity that we could give for them? Good things would happen. And I want one, too!

Please do not brand the phone “tubular”.

Please Show E=mc2 for RAIN

On the component level, after a decade of hard work, we have the basic performance metrics for both RAIN tagged items (TIPP) and readers (reader sensitivity testing). Please show everybody how the system level performance can be reasonably estimated based on those performance metrics! I mean the environment is a difficult variable, but on your discretion, just define a new variable , like you gave the speed of light “c” for Albert Einstein.

That’s all! Travel safe, protect yourself against frostbites and watch out for those house-securing-bulldogs. Stay hydrated as well – I know the costume doesn’t ventilate too well.

All blog posts
All blog posts

What Do Babies and RFID Have in Common?

Sep 26, 2017

About the author

25Voyantic

Content

Something worried me before my first daughter’s arrival, something I had been already warned: “Babies are born without a handbook”. I am used to working with procedures, methodologies or at least to have some standards to follow; and now I was going to face the most demanding challenge in my life without any kind of guidance.

But, I gradually noticed that it was not going to be that way, and that the parallelism between the technology I have been working with for more than 15 years, RFID ― those intelligent chips enabling the Internet of Things which we can find in more and more stores and warehouses every day ―, was clear from minute zero. Many companies, end users and system integrators think, like I did in early stage, that there are no rules nor guidelines for a project to become successful, but that trial and error is the only way to gain experience to face it with. Is that how I should bring my daughter up, by trial and error?

Look for Help – It Is Available!

As with RFID, when Carlota was born, tranquility came by being surrounded by experts in the field, and not just sympathizers who have faced that same situation. Firstly, I was provided with a handbook. Seriously! Guidelines about what to do in certain situations, such as tips to interpret the baby’s cries. Better than improvising with the newborn, right? Likewise, the handbook suggested the baby to sleep on her back, while just a few years ago it was suggested to sleep on her stomach.

Having professionals, who advise us following the latest recommendations and standards, gives us the peace of mind to do things well in RFID, too.

For example, some years ago it was always recommended to do pilot tests before deploying an RFID project, but then we realized that the results were conditioned by the selected reader and selected tags. Yes, it seems obvious, but before even starting those pilot tests, readers and tags had already been chosen within the wide spectrum of combinations existing in the market. Doesn’t it make sense to first know what we need before choosing them? For this reason, nowadays professional RFID companies use standards (have you heard about the TIPP methodology by GS1?) and laboratory equipment capable of determining which RFID readers and tags in the market will give better results in a real test.

To Do Comparison You Need a Reference

Carlota was weighed, her length was measured, the diameter of her head was measured… these were going to be the indicators that would tell us if her growth was adequate or not. It is not useful to keep trying things; we must measure, measure Carlota and RFID, and do it with the right tools. But not only that! What a surprise when the kilograms and centimetres at the hospital were not the same kilograms and centimetres at the drugstore, not even the same as those at the pediatrician. How should I decide if everything is okay or not when one tool tells me “yes” and another “no”?

And I remembered so many customers I have who do not worry about calibrating their RFID measuring equipment, and a tag that could work with any reader when tested with a given equipment, but the same tag that would only work with the most powerful and sensitive readers when tested with other equipment.

Define Your Requirements Before Selecting the Solution

I have always insisted on my clients that they should not choose the best tag, but the most appropriate tag for their application; with my daughter this situation happens from diapers to milk, but not only with her milk, also with the adults’ milk! What kind of milk do you have in your fridge? The one with more calcium, vitamins, etc. on the market; the cheapest one; or the one you consider good enough for you and your family? The same thing happens with RFID tags, where it makes no sense to pay more for the best tag on the market, because there is no such ideal tag, but the one that is the best one for your application, the best milk for you.

Regarding prices, what should we think of the cheapest ones? Again, if their quality and features are the most convenient for us, they are definitely the best choice. Please pay attention to both concepts: good quality and minimum required features.

And what about the quality? I do not mean good finishes or performance … but that once a model is chosen, every diaper, every tag, always perform the same way; their features do not vary among them and they have a certain margin of operation. It seems obvious, but the cheapest tags on the market are usually cheap because although they all work (i.e. a standard RFID reader can detect them), not all of them perform the same way; some tags can be detected at much longer distance than others, even though being the same model. I checked it when I bought some cheaper diapers than the usual ones, which seemed to absorb as much as the best ones, but it was not always like that, whether it was a discreet pee or a champion one.

“Always” is an interesting and challenging concept, but at least we need to be prepared before the chosen diaper stops performing as expected and what would be acceptable. What if a customer makes the wrong choice and purchases 5 million reusable tags regardless of their operating margin? They could perform well today, and at the slightest change in the initial conditions of use, stop doing so.

Select Suppliers That You Can Trust

Finally, once the feeding bottles, diapers, milk were chosen, and their brands, prices and features were evaluated, we had to decide where to buy such an amount of supplies. I have to admit that we started buying some stuff online and taking advantage of promotions at the hypermarket, but it all depends on how seriously we want to get involved in bringing our daughter up. Right now, there are many things we decided to buy in pharmacies and specialized stores, not only for the qualified professionals who helped us from the beginning, but also for the access they have given us to brand events, training, samples of new products…

In the end, we are learning day by day. Carlota relies on us, and we rely on professionals and industry standards, because there is a reference for every industry. If in children’s upbringing references are driven by the WHO, which are followed by pediatricians; in RFID industry the guidelines are given by ISO, GS1 and RAIN RFID Alliance, and there are more and more system integrators and end users who, by following them, have stopped suffering with the deployment and adoption, respectively, of the technology. Why should we suffer as the result of improvising with our newborn instead of enjoying her growth without worries?

Welcome, Carlota.
RFID, it’s your time.

All blog posts
All blog posts

Using Tagging Performance Specifications to Secure 100% Readability of RFID Enabled Tires

Aug 17, 2017

About the author

29Janne Hämäläinen

I've been working as Director, EMEA at Voyantic since Nov 2016. Since 1992 I have been working in international business as project and sales management. Already at the beginning of 2005 I started to work in field of wireless solutions and IoT. I’m so excited to work within the growing and continuously developing RFID business.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

Identification of tires has been one of the early use cases of RAIN RFID already back in 2005. It took almost ten years for the technology and value chain to mature to a state when this extremely challenging application became finally possible.

Million Reasons to Tag Tires

There are countless ways to utilize RFID enabled tires. Early deployments follow the use cases familiar in the generic retail business: improving the traceability in the supply chain and raising efficiency in warehouse inventory and management. Over time I bet we will also see use cases after distribution, such as tire fleet management, safety monitoring (pressure, wear, retreading), and eventually even in recycling.

Once tires are RFID enabled, it opens enormous possibilities for companies to streamline processes and even create new business models.

“Scrapping a Finished Tyre is Not an Option”

If an embedded RFID tag is defected, it cannot be replaced with a new one because of safety and practical reasons. At the same time, no manufacturer is willing to scrap a new baked tire because of a non-functional RFID tag. Is there a way to avoid such a situation?

A carefully implemented quality monitoring helps keep the tire manufacturing process lean and efficient. RFID is implemented in various ways within the tire industry. Thus, preparing the tagging specifications according to actual use cases of the complete value chain is a prerequisite. Read more of this framework:

What is the Framework of RFID Tagging in Tire Industry?

Learn how to prepare tagging specifications according to actual use cases of the complete value chain!

Download Now

Embedding RFID UHF Tag into Rubber and RF Testing

Before embedding in rubber, the tire tags are tested in free-air conditions. UHF tire tags are typically over tuned to frequencies over 1 GHz. This makes RF testing a challenge because standard RFID readers operate at frequencies below 1 GHz.

Sensitivity of RAIN RFID UHF tag in different situations. The lower the graph, the higher the sensitivity and thus longer the read range.

From the manufacturing standpoint, additional requirements include:

  1. individual tag test should be wireless;
  2. test may be performed on trays with a large number of other tags in close proximity;
  3. the production flow cannot be slowed down.

The Voyantic solution is to utilize Tagsurance RFID tester together with the Snoop Pro near field coupling element. This enables accurate READ sensitivity tests for the complete dipole tag structure with excellent correlation to far-field performance.

RF testing used to be one of the bottlenecks in the tire tag production process. However, the sophisticated test features of the Tagsurance tester mean that the slowest processes are the mechanical ones.

Please read of our testing solution in more detail from our customer case study Michelin – Tire Tags with Consistent Quality!

Industry-Wide ISO Standards in the Horizon

The industry is currently waiting for the work group to finalize following standards, like

For an update on the ISO standards process, please stay tuned for an upcoming blog from Juho Partanen later this year.

If you’d like to hear how Voyantic can enable you to perform tire RFID testing in your facility, just drop us a line – it will be my pleasure to walk you through the process!

All blog posts
All blog posts

The Evolution of RAIN RFID Testing Started with Inlays, and Ends with…

Jul 07, 2017

About the author

16Juho Partanen

I enjoy seeing both the Voyantic employees and our customers thrive. The grand majority of my time goes into projects and initiatives that grow the RAIN RFID market in the long term. My remote office is on a boat on the archipelago of Finland.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

Evolution of organisms is one broadly accepted theory. Let me walk you through the phases evolution has taken when it comes to RAIN RFID tag testing.

Starting Point: The RFID Inlay

In the end of 90s there were no off-the-shelf solutions to start doing RFID research and tag testing. Hence the classical Radar Cross-section (RCS) seemed like a great way to characterize the UHF antenna of an inlay. It’s just that such a passive antenna test didn’t enable designers even to optimize the forward link: matching the impedance of IC with the impedance of the antenna. As a result, it was a struggle to get the tag tuning right. Additionally, the RCS measurement told nothing of the read range that the inlay design can deliver.

Delta Radar Cross-section (deltaRCS) was a serious step in the right direction for two reasons: the impedance match could be better analyzed and the fundamental reverse link parameters were brought into consideration. Read ranges started to improve. Around 2005-2007 also the first commercial tag test systems became available. Those systems, such as the Tag Analyzer from SAVR Communications, the Voyantic Tagformance and MeETS from CISC, already utilized the Class 1 Gen2 protocol to better grasp the actual performance of an RFID inlay. Pavel Nikitin’s paper from 2012 explains the theory and practicalities of diverse test systems in detail.

As tag prototypes were made and production samples tested, many companies focused mainly on the inlay performance in free air conditions. It didn’t take long for the first experts to realize that the test results better correlated with the real-world use case performance when the inlays were attached on various materials prior to testing. So, approaching the current decade it seemed half of the industry was busy working with various reference material sets, and the other half with aluminum plates of various sizes.

Era of Testing Tags on Items

To bring more sense into real-world performance of inlays, Voyantic introduced the Application Development Suite already in 2008. With the Population Analysis function anyone could visualize and study the behaviour and properties of tags in groups. As we have later learned, very few did such analysis before 2011, which manifests two related findings:

  1. The more groundbreaking the concept, the longer time it takes to really sink in
  2. It takes a lengthy period of time for engineers to learn how to explain certain groundbreaking concepts in an understandable way.

Tag-to-tag close coupling effects are indeed complex, and only partially understood and explained by the academic community even today. As a kind of workaround, the ARC Program emerged in 2011 to combine exhaustive label testing with data collection from actual RAIN use cases in retail. Outcome of that analysis are the ARC performance categories and the related certified inlay lists.

These ARC inlay lists simplified tag selection for the US retailers. I’d also state that the success of the ARC program pushed the technology vendors to seek additional ways to ease the adoption of RAIN RFID technology by collaboration. It can be said that the Program may have slowed down the market entry time for new inlay types and vendors obviously because they needed to pay and wait for certification tests before getting on those lists.

On the positive side waiting pays off, because the ARC inlays lists are one functional way for a new vendor to gain access to the US retail deployments.

Early this decade the performance testing elsewhere in the RFID ecosystem already focused on tags on actual items. However, the industry lacked a documented and open framework to correlate various test setups with each other. This void, together with the industry’s quest to improve the scalability of deployments, led to VILRI’s tagged item prototype project. Eventually that project gave birth to the Tagged Item Performance Protocol, aka TIPP, in 2015.

TIPP is a standard-like guideline from GS1 that establishes and combines three fundamental aspects:

  • Key performance metrics for RAIN enabled items
  • Test methodology that anyone can repeatedly use to extract these metrics
  • Performance grades for individual and stacked items.

Among its other benefits, the open and thoroughly documented TIPP guideline enables anyone to easily communicate their tagging requirements without sharing details of their processes and use cases.

Following the TIPP approach tagging solution providers are free to innovate and offer their latest products and solutions immediately without the need to have them certified by third parties.

How Would You Like Your RAIN Enabled Items? Separate, Boxed, Stacked, Hanging…

Close coupled RAIN enabled sporting goods

In the fall of 2017 an update to TIPP introduces a new test protocol for dense hanging stacks. This test protocol puts 100% reads of all the items to the focus, and thus leaves the close coupling effect purely for tagging experts to handle and solve. I anticipate that RAIN deployments especially around sporting goods retail will benefit from this new test protocol.

RAIN Read Performance Requires Input Also From the Reader Side

Albeit the tag side already enjoys highly sophisticated performance test framework, there are still a few missing pieces on the RAIN reader side. The Reader Sensitivity Test Recommendation from the RAIN Alliance was a grand milestone already. The dialogue and evolution would greatly speed up if the industry stakeholders, such as GS1 and RAIN Alliance, would take initiative to derive meaningful open performance metrics for read zones and readers in general.

That’s my evolution story for now. And no, the evolution of RAIN tag testing has not stalled, instead it’s constantly looking for new paths to make RAIN technology spread more efficiently. That’s also where Voyantic keeps on investing in. Your feedback on these thoughts will be greatly appreciated!

All blog posts
All blog posts

When Buying Tags – Ask the Right Questions

Jun 16, 2017

About the author

15Teemu Ainasoja

I am Sales Director at Voyantic. I have over 15 years of experience from the RFID industry in Europe and the USA. I have two master's degrees: in industrial engineering and in marketing, and two patents in auto-ID technology. I am actively participating in RAIN RFID alliance activities.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

I frequently lecture in RFID training events, and now and then, a question comes up from RFID users and system integrators: “When buying RAIN RFID tags, what should we ask from suppliers, and what should we tell the potential supplier?”. I asked the same question from some RFID tag manufacturers and spiced the answers up with my own experiences and collected the following summary from the answers.

How to Get a Good Quotation for RFID Tags

Plenty of information is related to the tag selection. The more information that can be given to the tag supplier, the easier it is for them to propose a good tag. And the better questions you ask, the better answers you get, and the easier it is to make an educated decision. At the same time, it is essential to keep the focus – what is important for the project at hand and what can be left out.

The issues to consider and communicate are in the following areas:

  • Use case – what can I tell about the tag use
  • Tag functionality
  • Tag format, shape and size
  • Durability requirements
  • Performance requirements
  • Delivery format and quantities
  • Printing and encoding needs
  • Quality data
  • Delivery terms and pricing
  • Change management
  • Additional services from the supplier

There are plenty of questions under each of these areas. Download our free RAIN RFID tag buyer’s guide to get a more comprehensive understanding and an example request for a quotation!

Download the RFID Tag Buyer’s Guide

Learn what to ask when buying RFID tags.
Get our example request for quotation to help you get relevant quotes.

Download now
All blog posts
All blog posts

RFID Journal Live in Phoenix – The New Exciting Stuff Was in IEEE RFID

Jun 02, 2017

About the author

22Jukka Voutilainen

I am the CEO and co-founder of Voyantic, a company that specializes in RFID test and measurement solutions. Before starting Voyantic in 2004, I worked as a researcher at the Helsinki University of Technology focusing on passive RFID sensing for moisture in building structures.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

This year’s RFID Journal Live! was arranged in Phoenix, AZ three weeks ago. I have been scanning through different reports about the show, and they all seem to amplify my own perception: the overall business was good, things are moving forward, but there was nothing particularly new and exciting this time. Sure, the inventory robots were still there, readers are integrating with antennas, and some new chips were announced, but that’s about it.

So, instead of writing about Journal Live!, this year I am focusing my show report on a co-located event that always delivers something new, the IEEE RFID conference. The conference was arranged for the 11th time, and I think I have only missed it once – though often I have had to divide my time between IEEE and the trade show.

The conference featured two excellent key-note presentations: Secure RFID for Trusting Devices and Data by René Martinez of Honeywell and Near-Zero Power Radio Frequency Receivers by Troy Olsson of DARPA. And then there were a total of 32 technical papers presented. Most papers were accepted in these categories:

  • Localization
  • Protocols and Security
  • Antennas and Propagation
  • Circuits, Devices and Readers

So, it seems that localization is on the rise, as the category has reached the top from outside the top-5 of 2016 event. I haven’t really seen asset localization properly break through in the industry, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it did in the near future.

Poster Session

During the last few years, IEEE RFID has arranged a poster session in the RFID Journal Live! exhibition area. So, if you do one thing to learn about what is going on in the research space, I recommend browsing through the poster area. In just half an hour you will get a nice overview of the latest research related to circuits, protocols, antennas, chipless sensors, etc. This year, there were a total of 25 posters from universities around the world, but also one from the industry: the French company Primo1D had a poster about their RFID yarn. A full list of poster titles can be found here.

This year, I was privileged to be a member of an expert panel that was assigned to choose the best poster. It took us two hours of looking through the posters, interviewing the presenters, and discussing, until we were able to decide the winner:

“A Dual-Band Wireless Power Transfer and Backscatter Communication Approach for Implantable Neuroprosthetic Devices” by Eleftherios Kampianakis and Apoorva Sharma (University of Washington, USA); Jose Arenas (University of Washington, Chile); Matthew Reynolds (University of Washington, USA).

The presented research combines UHF and HF RFID, as well as many disciplines of electronics and RF engineering into an implantable neuroprosthetic testbed. A more detailed description can be found here.

Best Paper Award

This year’s best paper award went to Pavel Nikitin of Honeywell for his paper titled ‘Self-Reconfigurable RFID Reader Antenna’. The paper presents a method for varying the beam of an antenna. The method is presented with a two-element Yagi antenna, where the parasitic element is loaded with a self-oscillating circuit. The ability to change the reader beam could be especially useful when inventorying static tag populations, e.g. when using an overhead reader to inventory a retail store.

But what pleased me most, was that some of the measurement data in Pavel’s paper was generated with the Voyantic Tagformance Pro system. Let me explain why.

This is me and my colleague Jesse back in 2006, sitting in front of the very first Tagformance prototype. We had just left our jobs at the university, and were frantically trying to build a system for testing the performance of UHF RFID tags. I spent hours of trying to understand papers written by Pavel Nikitin – then only a name to me. And we were able to pull it off: we got our system out to the market for RFID World 2007 which, by the way, was co-located with the very first IEEE RFID conference. Now, seeing our system used in one of Pavel’s papers 11 years later feels like the circle is closed.

All blog posts
All blog posts

Four Factors That Make Japan the Perfect Place to Deploy RAIN RFID in Convenience Stores

Apr 27, 2017

About the author

16Juho Partanen

I enjoy seeing both the Voyantic employees and our customers thrive. The grand majority of my time goes into projects and initiatives that grow the RAIN RFID market in the long term. My remote office is on a boat on the archipelago of Finland.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

The Nikkei Asian Review released a story about how some of the largest Japanese convenience stores plan to deploy RFID as a fix to severe labor shortage. Firstly, I am personally a huge fan of Japan and secondly, I’ve done quite a bit of work to speed up RAIN RFID deployments in the retail market. Still this announcement from Japan took me by surprise, and let me explain why.

Nikkei Asian Review: New RFID self-checkout systems will eliminate the need to scan each item individually, helping to cope with a severe lack of manpower.

Unconventional Motivation

This is the first time I’ve heard labor shortage to drive the RFID deployment. In Europe and the USA it’s been more about omni-channel sales that creates sales uplift, and all the efficiencies that simply result from high inventory accuracy.

Still, as you give it a moment to sink in, isn’t this just perfect news – labor shortage as a new driver has emerged and greatly motivates several large stakeholders to engage in this initiative, including Seven-Eleven, Lawson, Familymart and even the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry!

For me Japan is the most intriguing piece of the plot, and let me outline the four factors that I believe will help this initiative all the way to success:

Factor #1: Collective Efficiency in Their Veins

The culture enables the Japanese to behave and act highly efficiently in extremely large and dense crowds. If a new form of practice is available to improve public efficiencies, the Japanese are the first ones to oblige.

Consider the notorious train rush every morning between 8AM and 9AM. The Yamanote Line, for example, is an amazing experience. With a ridership of over 1,000,000 passengers overcrowding is both a challenge and a fact. Keep to the left and go with the flow, yes, but there is more to the story.

Factor #2: Payment Cards as the Sixth Finger

You can’t get around in Tokyo without a Suica® or a Pasmo® card. Based on the Sony FeliCa® technology, these rechargeable payment cards enable the commuters to quickly pass through the ticket gates at the JR and Subway stations, and help maintain the efficient flow of people in the jampacked station platforms.

You can conveniently use the same payment cards for many of the small purchases you stumble around the stations. As you take a moment with it, actually kiosks, taxis, cafes and many other small businesses seem to even endorse Suica® over coins.

Factor #3: Ubiquitous Automation

For the sake of efficiency and convenience, a metropol such as Tokyo is filled with automation to assist the consumers. I’d especially highlight the vending machines that you can find around in corridors and even on the station platforms. Take the automated ordering systems at fast-food restaurants as the second example. Automation and advanced user experience even follow the average Haruto-san all the way to the restrooms as well.

Factor #4: Local Retail Technology Vendors

If one has ever visited the RetailTech Exhibition in Tokyo Big Sight, it is pretty clear for a Japanese retailer that there are many Japanese based top brands to choose the implementer partner from: Toshiba TEC, Sato, Fujitsu, NCR, Ricoh…. On top of that, there is a great number of local experienced RFID label solutions providers, such as FVG, Sato, Toppan Forms, Toppan Printing, and Fine Label to name a few. Altech provides expertise and solutions related to RFID label testing and manufacturing.

A local partner is a great asset for clearing obstacles and moving any project forward at a fast pace.

A Few Ideas to Support Success

As a few generations of Japanese consumers are native to utilizing payment cards and automation in their everyday life, the RFID based self-checkouts at convenience stores should be nothing new. The local ecosystem of RAIN RFID vendors already exists, so I would only list two long-term implementation success factors to closely consider by all the stakeholders:
1. Utilize EPC numbering for the tagged sale items, because proprietary item numbering systems overlap sooner or later and then erode the RFID system reliability
2. Utilize the GS1 TIPP Guideline to specify the tagged item performance requirements, because TIPP makes the deployment more future-proof and enables the suppliers to manage tagging economically.

Voyantic provides easy-to-use turn-key solutions for TIPP testing.

With this said, I hope all goes well with the initiative. Please drop me a line if you’d like to raise further conversation around the topic!

SUICA is a registered trademark of East Japan Railway Company
PASMO is a registered trademark of PASMO Co., Ltd.
FeliCa is a registered trademark of Sony Corporation

All blog posts
All blog posts

RAIN RFID Speeds Up Season Cycles of Apparel Value Chain

Mar 27, 2017

About the author

15Teemu Ainasoja

I am Sales Director at Voyantic. I have over 15 years of experience from the RFID industry in Europe and the USA. I have two master's degrees: in industrial engineering and in marketing, and two patents in auto-ID technology. I am actively participating in RAIN RFID alliance activities.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

I had the pleasure of attending a networking event of Americas Apparel Producers’ Network – AAPN a few weeks ago. The presentation topics and discussions ranged from lighter reminiscences of past gatherings to hard core statistics around today’s retail.

As a take-away I thought a grim view was painted of the main stream apparel value chain of brand owners and retailers. This traditional apparel retail value chain seems slow and rigid; and is definitely challenged by online sales and vertically integrated fast fashion companies.

Recently I’ve also heard presentations from a couple of vertically integrated retail chains – with focus on their RAIN RFID projects. Those stories painted a more positive view of the retail value chain.

Read on to see how these two opposite forecasts might merge.

Slow Moving and Heavy Inventory Make Department Stores Suffer

The key issue is summed up in a few bullet points:

  • Traditional value chain takes an average of 9 months to get from a product idea to sales.
  • Because of slow processes the chain must rely on heavy stocking of manufactured goods.
  • Because of large stocks, a large portion of products are still unsold when fashion changes. Items are sold with high average discounts.
  • Add the fixed cost of retail stores and problems arise.

Announced department store closures were provided as an evidence:

Online and Fast Fashion Thrives

On-line stores can sell with the same cost of goods sold and pricing structure, but with lower fixed costs. Bottom line is still positive. Fast fashion chains can maintain lower stock levels and follow fast trends more quickly. There is less need to high discounts and margins are enough to cover fixed costs. There is profit to invest.

Root Cause Is the Traditional Management Focus on Costs

An analysis is presented in Apparel News article.

  • In the traditional model the link between retailer and brand owner is broken.
  • Retailers focus on cost. It is the only item they can fully control and they fully understand. And apparel manufacturers must follow with cost focus. There are no resources to improve processes or focus on the yarn types and fabric qualities. It is hard to break this malicious cycle.

Information Sharing Should Become The New Focus

RAIN RFID is a technology that can create a vast amount of data, and turn that data into meaningful information. When this information is produced at the retailer and shared with brand owner, the value chain can be improved.

Decathlon case study by Tageos
Inditex presentation

There are plenty of case studies like the ones above. But let’s look some use cases beyond the case studies – how RAIN RFID can be used in shortening the cycle times.

Faster Everything Means More Efficient Everything

With RAIN RFID tagged store merchandise, replenishment needs at the shop floor are noticed in real time, and the information can be shared real time with warehouse, distribution and factory. When the rules are set, just rely on EDI and automation to keep the stores running. Every party in the supply chain knows how much stock there is at various upstream locations, and when is their time to react.

The key enabler is the accurate and real time inventory – the key deliverable of RAIN RFID. When the process works, the initial stock levels can be lower across the value chain, and there’s your Cost Saving right there.

Instant Feedback from Store to Design Accelerates Season Cycles

As the merchandise is RAIN tagged due to the efficiency reasons stated above, smart fitting rooms, info kiosks and store associates can be utilized to collect information about consumer preferences. Real-time pre-purchase information about models, sizes, and colors that are interesting to customers can be used to optimize store layouts, but especially valuable it is to the brand owners.

Such insight enables the designer to assume a new kind of ownership of the product. Minor fixes can even be implemented during a season. This real-time collaboration through the value chain rises the clock rate of traditional brick and mortar stores to match and exceed the vertically intergrated ones.

What Should Apparel Manufacturers Do?

Instead of following the lead of retailers, the brand owners should assume a more active role. Here’s a couple of pointers:

  • Learn the basics of RAIN RFID – consider a webinar, attend a 101 course or follow the RAIN Alliance.
  • Take a look at what your fellow competitors are doing: The Herman Kay case study by GS1 sets a great example, and here’s another story referencing lululemon and Adidas
  • Instead of being compliant, manufacturers should check that requirements take into account also manufacturers’ own needs – manufacturers should especially demand the requirements in a format that enables them to scale and optimize, such as the GS1 TIPP grades.

What Has Voyantic to Do with All of This?

Voyantic offers RAIN RFID testing solutions and systems. Our performance testing equipment enables anyone to implement RAIN RFID tagging according retailer’s and manufacturer’s requirements. Our solutions ensure quality monitoring across the whole tagging process. We are happy to provide more information of RFID – start from our webinars, for example!

All blog posts
All blog posts

GS1 Releases the TIPP Global Guideline – Streamlines RAIN RFID Adoption in Retail and Fosters Tagging Innovations

Feb 01, 2017

About the author

16Juho Partanen

I enjoy seeing both the Voyantic employees and our customers thrive. The grand majority of my time goes into projects and initiatives that grow the RAIN RFID market in the long term. My remote office is on a boat on the archipelago of Finland.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

After over 18 months of hard work, the TIPP work group under the GS1 Global Office has now released the Tagged Item Performance Protocol (TIPP) for global usage. The guideline focuses on readability of tagged items, supports all the global RAIN RFID frequencies, and also comes with additional supportive documentation to make the adoption process easier.

Many experts have invested a considerable amount of time in the creation of this guideline, and I am personally pleased with the outcome. The feedback that I’ve already collected leads me to believe that the standard lays out useful guidance also for RAIN RFID projects outside of the retail sector. Read on to learn what this standard means for the industry and end users.

TIPP Simplifies RAIN RFID Adoption for Retailers

The early adopters of RAIN RFID technology needed to cope with plenty of piloting, in-store testing and other iterative procedures to make the technology work out for them. A decade later, now in 2017, both the technology itself and the surrounding ecosystem have matured. Standards also emerge to make adoption of technology easier, faster and less expensive.

TIPP grades establish a common vocabulary and methodology for the RAIN RFID ecosystem. Original chart adopted from Impinj Inc., with modifications.

The end users define their specific tagging requirements as TIPP grades that are easy to communicate between stakeholders. Similar standard communication methods are already utilized in barcoding, EPC tag data standard and product attributes – standards boil down complicated technical issues into simple ones thus removing headaches and misunderstandings.

But wait a minute – some retailers rely on the approved inlay lists from the ARC Program, so what is the relevance of TIPP for them?

TIPP Scales – Removes Bottleneck of the ARC Program

The well-known ARC Program uses a sophisticated test system to gather and compile a database of RFID label performance characteristics. Combined with the end user specific requirements gathered during pre-pilot tests, the local experts then maintain certified inlay lists across retail item categories.

However, a limitation of the ARC Program is that the only official place to perform the tests for a newly developed inlay or retail item category is the one Auburn University test laboratory in Alabama, USA. There are only a limited number of experts available for pre-pilots, thus a bottleneck gradually developed.

As the number of deployments started rising across continents, the ecosystem simply needed methodology that scales. Now that the TIPP guideline establishes open grades and open test methodology, anyone can start performing TIPP tests locally and the bottleneck is removed.

Under the hood TIPP is about 95% the same as the ARC test setup. The main difference is how the test data is interpreted. In fact it should be acknowledged that the ARC Lab Director Justin Patton and Director of Technology Dr. Senthilkumar CP both gave significant contribution during the creation of TIPP US.

TIPP grading test system is essentially a similar 4 channel setup as the ARC test system.

TIPP grading test system

Building the Future for Smarter Packages

An aspect of TIPP is that it enables tagging solutions providers to innovate with new breeds of smart packages since they are no longer dictated to work only with inlay-based RAIN labeling. Moving away from diverse inlay lists also brings increased possibilities for suppliers to drive down the cost of tagging. In this perspective I don’t expect the cost of an inlay to drop as such, instead I am confident that management, stocking of labels and finishing processes around tagging will find new efficiencies.

Origins of TIPP Date Back to VICS and ILRI

For the folks out there that want to understand how TIPP came to existence, I’ve gathered a brief history piece in another document. If ILRI, VICS or ARC Arkansas rings any bells, you may want to give the History of TIPP document two minutes of your time.

In essence TIPP is rooted on

  1. the joined effort within the retail industry to increase the efficiency and transparency of supply chains
  2. the pain that RFID projects caused for the early adopters in the retail industry
  3. the learnings from prior technology implementations, such as barcodes
  4. the ongoing RAIN RFID deployment evolution from handheld scanners to zone sensor infrastructure.

Next Step: Guideline to Be Adopted by Retailers

As the TIPP guideline was developed for the retail community by the request of the retail community, I next look forward to the retailers and their suppliers to start adopting this global guideline. To make the transition smoother this time around, the guideline comes with supportive documentation both for the retailers and solution providers.

The GS1 TIPP website offers new fantastic documentation for both techies and non-techies.

Needless to say, if there are any obstacles on the way, both the GS1 Member Organizations and technology vendors are glad and available to assist. A new test protocol for dense stacks will be added to the standard in Q2/2017 together with new grades – mighty good news for anyone in the sporting goods business!

Over time we all should learn more about the benefits that the standard offers. When it comes to simplifying RFID vendor compliance management, my recent blog post already discussed that side of the story.

Methodology Likely to Find Ground Also Outside of Retail

I’ve had the privilege to explain and justify TIPP for various stakeholders over the recent couple of years. Received feedback suggests that the end user segments outside of retail consider TIPP as a benchmark of how to express tagging requirements in a scalable way. One hurdle for those folks in various businesses will be to find and motivate an un-biased association to efficiently nurture the standard creation – same as VILRI and later GS1 did for retail.

Any comments or concerns? Please let me hear it!

All blog posts
All blog posts

TIPP Offers Both Low-Hanging Fruits and Long-Term Efficiencies for Everyone in the Retail Supply Chain

Dec 13, 2016

About the author

16Juho Partanen

I enjoy seeing both the Voyantic employees and our customers thrive. The grand majority of my time goes into projects and initiatives that grow the RAIN RFID market in the long term. My remote office is on a boat on the archipelago of Finland.

Content

中文版 Chinese version

In the name of vendor compliance, many suppliers and brand owners are facing new RAIN RFID product tagging requirements from their retailer customers. The new TIPP standard harmonizes these requirements, bringing transparency and new cost efficiencies within grasp of all parties. Continue reading to catch some more good news coming your way!

RAIN RFID Adoption Challenge #1: Managing a Multi-Party Technology Project

I am sure you have all been there: a room full of people and a couple over remote connection, and someone with opening words – “Good Morning Everyone. We now have this new vendor requirement we need to satisfy. It concerns most of you and some of our partners, too.”.

What happens then is roughly a factor of project management, technology maturity, number of involved parties, communication skills and team endurance.

Adoption Challenge #2: Balancing the Short-Term Goals and Long-Term Efficiencies

You may have noted that when a deadline approaches, the time perspective also shortens. It’s only human nature that this leads to decisions that seem simple and make sense in the short-term, but which lead to excess expenditure and even re-engineering projects in the long-term. It’s a twisted set of requirements that is difficult to put in balance.

When it comes to an RFID implementation, I would personally list the signs of short-sighted decisions to include usage of inlay lists, selecting the cheapest label supplier, and utilizing of proprietary numbering systems.

Transition from an IT Project to a Compliance Process is Easier if Implementation is Based on Standards

During the roll-out phase, an RFID project definitely involves the folks over at the IT department. There are new streams of information flowing between companies, and also bits going back and forth in the new RAIN reader infrastructure within the company itself.

However, as all that is successfully solved and implemented, the IT maestros turn their focus back on geek black magic, Linux and Dr. Pepper. The whole thing basically turns into a compliance and quality management process that runs 24/7 and is managed by different people: Vendor Compliance Manager, Quality Manager, or similar. It is at that time when standards, defined maintenance routines and ISO 9001 quality systems show their power.

Take the Simple Route and Base Tagging Requirements on TIPP

Tagged Item Performance Protocol (TIPP) is a global standard developed by the spearhead retailers, their suppliers and the RFID technology community. TIPP utilizes a grading approach that enables anyone to define varying tagging requirements for different product categories.

I’d actually like to point out the TIPP analogy to hangers, where the “Voluntary Guidelines for Hanger Specifications for Floor-Ready Merchandise” by GS1 states that “Hanger performance is the key metric, not the material.” The very same applies to RFID, where the readability of tagged items is the key, not the logo on the RFID inlays.

TIPP grades enable retailers to efficiently determine tagging requirements based on their own read scenarios without sharing any sensitive information unnecessarily with outsiders. Naturally it’s ok to turn to trusted solution providers that can perform the necessary tests and determine which TIPP grades to utilize in different product categories.

Paving the Way to Long-Term Process Efficiencies

TIPP grading enables the suppliers and brand owners to work with their partners and solution providers to find cost-effective tagging solutions that both meet the vendor compliance requirements, aka TIPP grades, and their own process preferences. This way the decision making on label purchases is distributed to where costs and supply chain efficiency can be best managed.

Wait, there is more: TIPP practically removes the in-store validation tests that are now essential to the maintenance of retailer specific inlay lists! In-store testing of labels is a significant operational burden and expense, which was indeed quite necessary at the early days of RFID adoption in retail. Now that the technology has matured, it’s time to reassign all performance and validation testing to parties that efficiently perform it as part of their daily routines.

Lean on the Technology Providers

Today there are numerous technology providers close by you that can assist you in meeting your RFID retail mandates and requirements. To find solution providers try these search engines:

It goes without saying that you ought to be a demanding customer for all these folks out there – don’t accept the first proposal without hearing more about the alternatives. Always demand a standard solution without vendor-lock and have the short- and long-term implications spelled out.

Yes, We Can (in January)

The original TIPP guideline came out in the USA in 2015. The guideline already introduced the performance grades approach, but was limited to the FCC frequency band. To create a global version that also covers the ETSI, Chinese and various other bands, the GS1 Global set up a workgroup in summer of 2015. I have been co-chairing the workgroup for about a year now together with Plamen Iliev of Embisphere.

January is going to be exciting in many ways. I am delighted to point out that a global TIPP standard is already ratified and will be officially released by the GS1 in January 2017. Please contact us if you want to discuss these issues in more detail, and see you at the NRF in New York!

RFID tagged men’s shirts in a department store in Helsinki, Finland. I simply wanted to add this picture here in the end because it’s just such a beautiful sight.

All blog posts