Big opportunity for Indian software industry in RFID

There is a big opportunity in the development and implementation of RFID (radio frequency identification) based software solutions for the Indian software industry, according to Ravi Mathur, CEO, EPC Global India.

More specifically, "the greatest opportunity will be the middleware segment where IT companies can develop softwares to pick up RFID data and also work on network security," added Mathur.

EPC Global India is part of a global industry government initiative that is leading the development of standards for Electronic Product Code (EPC) to support the use of RFID.

"The market is very big and that can be appreciated from the fact that to install RFID solutions in one WalMart store it will cost $ 200,000," says Mathur.

But the greatest hurdle in the implementation of RFID solutions is the lack of common standards and the prohibitive cost of technology which increases the cost of items. The highly fragmented competitive environment is also a drawback.

"But these obstacles can be resolved, when there is standardisation. Earlier RFID tags bought from one vendor by a company could not be read by another company unless they used the same RFID system but this has changed with standardisation of usage," says Mathur.

At present the cost of one RFID tag is 15 cents (about Rs 7) but with more and more orders placed, the cost is expected to come down.

"Last year Gillette placed an order for 250 billion tags when the global production of tags were around 4 billion and this brought down the prices significantly," says Mathur.

In India, the awareness is slowly picking up with Airports Authority of India (AAI) showing interest in RFID for cargo as well as passenger goods management. "There is a huge scope in the defence sector as well," says Mathur.

The recent announcement by the Wireless Planning and Development Authority that radio frequency in UHF (Ultra high Frequency ) 865-867 Mhz band for use of RFID solutions is in line with the international developments wherein radio frequencies are being allocated within 860-960 Mhz for operating mission critical supply chain applications across various segments.

RFID has been around since World War II, when the Scottish physicist Robert Alexander Watson came up with a new application of radio frequency developed for identifying friendly aircraft. Now this technology is fast catching up with the enterprises.

RFID has the potential to play an important role in the supply chain management of enterprises. RFID enables implementation of various applications like counterfeit detection, product visibility, recall and security of goods.

With the semiconductor industry and mobile communication technology maturing, RFID is expected to enter the market in a big way.