Performance Improvements Based on RFID - Empirical Findings from a Cross-Sectional Study

Based on a cross-sectoral survey among 114 RFID-using companies in Germany, the constitutive factors for performance improvement are evaluated. Analyzing realized target variables such as lead time or production downtime, we can show that the performance-enhancing impact of RFID can be ascribed to the three effects automation, informatization, and transformation. However, automation alone – i.e. a reduction of manual data acquisition activities through RFID – does not systematically contribute to performance enhancement. Rather, we found evidence indicating that it is necessary to exploit improved information about enterprise resources (informatization) and/or to re-engineer business processes (transformation) on the basis of RFID. No matter what sector an enterprise belongs to, investments in RFID technology that are exclusively aimed at an automated acquisition of information are inadvisable. This might be of special interest to companies who are facing a mandate in the near future

Adoption of RFID technologies in UK logistics: moderating roles of size, barcode experience and government support

Due to globalization, logistics has become an important part in the supply chain. Many logistics service providers have realised the importance of adoption of technologies that can help manufacturers, warehouses, and retailers to communicate with each other more efficiently. Among many logistics technologies, radio frequency identification (RFID) has been identified as an important technology to improve logistics operations and supply chain management, and thus is increasingly gaining both practitioners’ and researchers’ attention. The purpose of this study is to identify the impact of usability features of RFID in the adoption of the technology by the logistics sector in the UK. We have used questionnaire survey method to collect data from the UK logistics firms. The analysis of the data shows that the usability of RFID technology positively influences adoption of technology. We have further tested the moderating effects of firm size, experience with barcode use, and government support in adopting RFID. Our results show that government support strongly moderates the link between usability of RFID and its adoption but size and experience with barcode do not moderate this link. We elaborate the contributions of the study and managerial implications of our results in this pape

AMCIS 2007 Panel Summary: The Promise of RFID Technologies

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) has started to revolutionize the way today\u27s organizations do business. Since its highly publicized adoption by Wal-Mart, several companies have started using RFID in their supply chains with varying results. On the academic level, many new research streams have been launched concerning the applications of RFID in business. However, whether or not the academic community is ready to adopt this technology itself remains a question. To consider the future of this technology in research and industry alike, the authors organized two panels on the topic of the promise of RFID technologies at the 2007 Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS) held in Keystone, Colorado. They also demonstrated the capability of the technology using a proof-of-concept pilot system as a means for providing added services to conference attendees. This article reports on the two panels, as well as on the results from the pilot experiment

RFID for returnable container management in the automotive industry: A Discrete-Event Simulation approach

Returnable containers are a critical factor to ensure quality of manufacturing operations in the automotive industry. However, containers management is still affected by chronic issues, such as containers shortage, losses or inefficient handling. Research and industry experts agree the “Achilles’s heel” of current practice is the lack of accurate and timely data about containers flow throughout the complex automotive supply chain. Moreover, containers handling operations still rely on manual operations. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is a technology that allows for automatic extraction of items flow data at key points along the supply chain, without the need of manual operations, and represents a very interesting solution for returnable containers management. RFID has already been employed in many different sectors, since giants as Wal-Mart or the United States (U.S.) Department of Defense adopted it for their supply-chain. Several approaches have been adopted in literature to explore potential applications of this technology, but few studies focus on automotive returnable containers management. In this work, a Discrete-Event Simulation (DES) approach is proposed to evaluate the impact of RFID on automotive returnable containers supply chain. The model has been developed in collaboration with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA). Applying factorial design and ANOVA relevant benefits of using RFID have been identified. The same model has been used to define main influencing factors in containers supply chain performance

FEASIBILITY OF RFID TECHNOLOGY IN THE SUPPLY CHAIN OF ABB MEDIUM VOLTAGE PRODUCTS

Tämä pro gradu tutkielma käsittelee RFID – teknologian soveltuvuutta ABB Oy Medium Voltage Productin toimitusketjussa. Tutkimus toteutettiin tapaustutkimuksena käyttäen sekä laadullisia että määrällisiä menetelmiä. Tutkimuksen taustalla vaikutti yritysten tarve kehittää ja tehostaa tuotantoketjun toimintaa. Jotta yrityksen toiminta säilyisi kannattavana tulevaisuudessa kiristyvän kilpailun vallitessa, on nykyisillä resursseilla kyettävä toimimaan entistä tehokkaammin. Tutkielman viitekehyksen perustana oli alaan liittyvä kirjallisuus sekä tieteelliset elektronisessa muodossa olevat ajankohtaiset julkaisut. Osa teoksista oli julkaistu jo monia vuosia sitten, mutta perusajatukset RFID – teknologiasta ovat pysyneet muuttumattomina. Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli selvittää RFID – teknologian toteutettavuutta ABB Medium Voltage Productsin toimitusketjun eri vaihessa. Lisäksi tuotiin esille erilaisia ehdotuksia siitä, miten RFID – teknologia voitaisiin käytännössä implementoida ABB:lle. Tavoitteena oli myös selvittää ja vertailla eri investointimahdollisuuksien takaisinmaksuaikoja toimitusketjun eri osissa. RFID – teknologian osalta pääajatus oli kuvata teknologia ensin yleisesti ja sitten tarkemmin yrityksen toimitusketjujen ja eri prosessien näkökulmista. RFID – teknologian käytännön sovelluksia ja toteutuneita projekteja löydettiin myös ja niitä etsittiin siksi, jotta voitaisiin huomata miten toiminta käytännössä tehostui. Keskeisin havainto oli huomata, että RFID – teknologia ei ole välttämätä aina järkevä investointi. Vaikka teknologia vaikuttaisi ensialkuun tehokkaalta ja luotettavalta, löytyy siitä useita ongelmakohtia ja haasteita joihin on tulevaisuudessa löydettävä toimivia ja kustannustehokkaita ratkaisuja. Tulevaisuudessa olisi tärkeää tutkia miten RFID tunnisteet saataisiin inegroitua piirikortteihin sekä kuinka teknologian käyttöönotto tehostaisi ulkoisen varaston tarjoajan prosesseja.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

Design and development of a low-cost high-performance vehicle mounted UHF RFID system for tracking goods and inventory.

Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.This research work investigates how to design and implement a low-cost high-performance vehicle mounted ultra-high frequency (UHF) radio frequency identification (RFID) system to keep track of cargo whilst in transit. The vehicle mounting include – inside or on cargo vehicle enclosures, the shipping containers, and so forth. In order to achieve a low-cost system, a low cost circularly polarized microstrip patch antenna, which also had a low axial ratio (AR) was designed. Since multiple antennas will be used, the cost factor will be reduced substantially if the cost of each antenna was reduced as compared to reducing the cost of a single RFID reader. The proposed antenna design, measuring 200mm x 200mm x 6.4mm, utilized the corner truncated technology with a thicker substrate and larger ground plane. Two independent simulations were done as well as empirical work. One of the simulations used Computer Simulation Technology (CST) studio suite software and the other used gpr Max simulation software. The investigations aimed at determining how different materials (steel, plastic, and wood) worsen the performance of the UHF RFID system inside a steel container as well as in free space. The investigation involved placing these materials onto the RFID tag and then varying the thickness of the material. The simulation results showed that the proposed antenna has a reflection coefficient of less than -10dB from 886.23 MHz to 924.96 MHz with a bandwidth of 38.73 MHz. The antenna provides the AR less than 3 dB for the frequency range from 915 MHz to 919 MHz. The designed and fabricated antenna has a bandwidth of 57.527 MHz and achieves a minimum reflection coefficient of -27.97 dB at 914.045 MHz. These results were then compared to other similar antenna designs. The antenna designed in this research achieved a lower axial ratio while still offering a respectable amount of gain, directivity and bandwidth. Previous papers showed that there was always a notably trade-off between having a low axial ratio and a high gain, directivity or bandwidth. The results for the simulation tests indicated that wood performs the best, followed by plastic and then steel. Wood and plastic were still detected by the RFID reader’s antenna at their maximum thickness of 20cm and 5cm respectively. It was further found out that the RFID system performs better inside a steel container than in free space. In conclusion the design of a low-cost high-performance circularly polarized microstrip patch antenna allows the cost of the overall UHF RFID system to be reduced, making it a more cost-effective solution for tracking containerized cargo. The antenna also achieved circular polarization which is beneficial to the performance of the UHF RFID system. A circularly polarized antenna allows the UHF RFID reader to detect RFID tags in almost any orientation. The simulation results emulate the data obtained when a horizontally orientated paper RFID tag was used. The results obtained showed the use of steel performed optimally when it is placed directly in line with the receiver. When using plastics, placing them directly in line with the receiver at a distance of 2.36 m, does not offer the best performance. If the plastic material is placed 3 m to the side of the receiver, it is best to use thicker material. The power increased by 3.73 dBm when the thickness of the plastic, increased from 5 mm to 50mm. The system’s performance increased with wood when the RFID tag is in line with the receiver at a distance of 2.36 m, and as the thickness was increased from 20 mm to 200 mm. When the RFID tag was placed 3 m to the side of the receiver, the system’s performance decreased as the thickness was increased from 20 mm to 200 mm.List of Publications on page vii

Mobile RFID, A Case from Volvo on Innovation in SCM

Today, the interest of RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology have resulted in various development and implementation activities at Volvo and other companies. Frequently the technology only substitutes the traditional bar-code and is not used in an innovative solution in order to improve supply chain performance and collaboration.RFID is emerging as a technology that is utilized for automatic identification of products and load units in different logistics contexts. The supply chain management context of today is increasingly complex, with global flows, just-in-time deliveries, customer demands for real-time track and trace capabilities, etc. Complexity and uncertainty is prevailing and a better understanding can be gained through research that provides contextualisations in areas such as aftermarket logistics. The large numbers of stakeholders in the supply chain, the desire to manage and control these complex supply chains demand better possibilities for data capture and increase of data capacity. The current developments are increasing the usage of advanced IS/IT solutions for logistics functions (Bowersox and Daugherty 1995, Stefansson 2004, Holmqvist & Pessi 2004). IS/IT development and implementation is considered as a critical issue. At the same time, logistics operations exist in a competitive environment and must secure fast and healthy return on each investment. Consequently, important considerations need to be made to how to manage this context.The implementation of new technologies and switch over from already established solutions, for example bar-codes, does not come free of charge. Baskerville et al. are addressing the need of agility from both business and IT perspectives while implementing and using new technology (Baskerville et al 2005). Most RFID solutions involve fixed and costly infrastructure installations where reading antennas and related equipment, network and communication systems as well as integration towards legacy systems need to be established. Such RFID solutions are only financially justified in setups with high volumes and high value items. Consequently, most implementations are based on closed-loop systems (Finkenzeller 2003; Fasth et al. 2005). Closed-loop systems refer to a intra company set-up where there is only one actor developing, implementing and utilizing the benefits of RFID, for example controlling assembly racks within a manufacturing plant without interaction between supply chain actors (actors are here used to describe both general participants in the supply chain as well as partners). An inhibiting factor for collaboration and more open systems is that the standardization of applying RFID is emerging but there are still implications since the standards are not (yet) widely used. An open system refers to a set-up in which several actors are collaborating and raping the benefits of a RFID implementation, for example assurance of delivery along the supply chain.The motivation behind the research presented in this paper is to explore how RFID can be utilized in more mobile and innovative ways and by that create new opportunities. In focus is a case including a setup of a mobile RFID solution using cellular networks (GSM/GPRS) together with web technology, has been evaluated from the perspectives of operational reliability, usability and productivity. A goal is that development and implementation of a mobile RFID solution that may leverage existing infrastructure, reduce integration needs and enable smooth collaboration can facilitate learning, usage and simplify implementations. By using the RFID tag as carrier of data, instead of other integration/data transfer it is possible to give the goods identification ‘smart’ features. ‘Smart goods’ is characterized by a higher level of sophistication than traditional goods identification. ‘Smart goods’ enhance supply chain performance through collaboration by enabling improved access, capture, usage, modification, dissemination and verification of information. The ‘smart goods’ capability is derived from utilization of RFID, cellular networks and web service technology. This paper is part of several years of collaborative research between academia and industry, based on in-depth access to characteristics of Volvo and their aftermarket supply chain. The objective is to explore the business value in a new RFID setup. The results may assist practitioners concerned with RFID initiatives and nurture the academic discussion in logistics and IS/IT in general and evaluation of ‘smart goods’ and mobile RFID in particular.This paper will now present the research method followed by a frame of reference. The focus is then made on the case study by describing the setup and characteristics. An analysis and evaluation of results is then made, with advantages and disadvantages, design constrains and business values, before concluding comments are presented