
2 CHAPTER ONE
solutions. Companies worked to decide which tags and readers to use, how to attach tags
to (or embed them in) containers or products, and how to test the read rates for RF tags on
pallets as they moved through doors and onto trucks. Several companies have announced
their support for what are now commonly known as tag and ship applications, which tag a
product just before shipping it somewhere else, but few of these companies have moved
beyond minimum compliance with the mandates to using the information on RFID tags to
increase efficiency in their own internal processes.
The mandates have also focused most of these early implementations on tagging, and thus
on the physical side of the RFID systems. However, while it is important to both select tags
and readers and find just the right arrangement of antennas to recognize tags as they
move through docks and conveyor belts, the true benefit (and complexity) of RFID sys-
tems doesn’t come from reading the tags, but from getting the information from those
reads to the right place in a usable form. The first 100 were only the beginning of the Wal-
Mart RFID rollout. Many more suppliers will be tagging pallets and cartons and some indi-
vidual items by the end of 2006. Meanwhile, the biggest news in RFID may surround the
ePedigree initiatives aimed at reducing counterfeiting and improving efficiency and safety
in the distribution of pharmaceuticals. ...