Tags to keep tabs

RFID is just beginning to make inroads in India

At Pune University's Jayakar library, members don't return books to a librarian or register the books they borrow at a counter behind which the librarian sits.

He or she simply places a smart card on one of the three "readers" or devices in the library and the books are automatically registered in his or her account.

Half the 4.25 lakh documents, books and periodicals in the library have an electronic label that costs Rs 50 pasted on them. In addition, two electronically monitored antennae have been set up at the library's entrance and exit.

If a book is unauthorisedly sneaked out of the library, a buzzer sounds at the entrance. To be sure, books can still be pilfered.

Says S K Patil, head of Pune University's library and information science department: "If someone tears off the page of the document where the electronic label is fixed, there is little we can do. The technology is akin to installing a large padlock on one's door. If a thief enters the house through the window, the robbery cannot be averted."

The technology in question, introduced at the library in August this year, is Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). Many say that not much RFID work has taken place here. Poppycock, we say. Sure, RFID is still in its infancy. But consider the following:

The Chitale Dairy at Bhiwladi in Maharashtra's Sangli district has installed RFID to monitor the feeding patterns of cattle and bison. An electronic tag is attached to the neck of cattle for this purpose.

Pantaloon Retail India is in discussions with Wipro on introducing RFID at its Tarapore factory for the next two months. If the pilot project helps save costs, the retail major will give Wipro the go ahead for implementing the technology in phases, starting with its warehouse at Tarapore.

Says Chinar Deshpande, chief information officer, Pantaloon Retail India: "Suppliers will have to become RFID-compliant eventually, if the technology is to be implemented for individual items. But, unlike Wal-Mart, we cannot force this technology on suppliers as the Indian retail supply market is not that mature. For now, it will be implemented only for Pantaloon's in house manufacturing and warehousing."

Nearly 45 colleges in Pune that fall under the three deemed universities or education trusts, including the R P Vidyapeeth, D Y Patil Prathisthan and Maharashtra Academy of Engineering, and the Baroda-based Babaria Institute of Technology, have introduced student identity RFID cards that allow students access to hostels and monitor their classroom attendance.

Each student will swipe his card at a reader to record his attendance. Attendance data can be uploaded on the internet and accessed by parents.

"For the hostel, a turnstile gate can be set up at which students will swipe cards. At the press of a button, the number of students there as well as visitors to the hostel can be found out," notes Aashim A Patil, CEO of the Pune-based Infotek Software & Systems, which supplied RFID software to the Pune University library and to the other educational institutes in Maharashtra.

Look at the RFID action

---

• Pune University's Jayakar library uses RFID tags on its books as well as library cards
  
  
• The Chitale Dairy at Bhiwladi in Maharashtra's Sangli district has installed RFID to monitor the feeding patterns of cattle and bisons
  
  
• Pantaloon Retail India is in talks with Wipro on introducing RFID at its Tarapore factory.
  
  
• More than 45 colleges in Pune and the Baroda-based Babaria Institute of Technology have introduced student identity RFID cards that allow students access to hostels and monitor their classroom attendance
  
  
• ITC has commissioned the Hyderabad-based Bartronics India to embark on an RFID project at ITC's Bangalore plant. This involves tracking the materials that go into the manufacturing of cigarettes

Still not convinced that RFID is starting to making inroads in India? Try this for size.ITC has commissioned the Hyderabad-based Bartronics India to embark on an RFID project at ITC's Bangalore plant. This involves tracking the materials that go into the manufacturing of cigarettes.

Bartronics has integrated an RFID tag-based system with the CNC machines ITC uses. That's not all. Bartronics is also working on 43 RFID projects, including one for Satyam that involves tracking laptops.

Explains Bartronics managing director Sudhir Rao: "In software companies, laptops are given to employees who sometimes take them home or for client presentations. However, the laptop that comes back into the company may or may not be the company's asset. "

In the capital, Ranbaxy Laboratories has started fixing RFID chips under the labels of drugs it supplies Wal-Mart. The chips contain information "� the manufacturer's name, the batch number, the expiry date and so on.

Says Govind Jaju, director, global supply chain, Ranbaxy Laboratories: "We are moving to the next generation bar code system to strengthen our global supply chain. We are doing this ahead of our deadline for Wal-Mart in the US. This technology will help Wal-Mart track the movement of our products automatically."

Still sceptical that RFID is becoming hot in India? In Bangalore, Wipro has opened an RFID proof-of-concept apparel store, along with Arvind Mills, on its campus. The store is part of Wipro's continuing work in RFID implementation.

Soon the company will set up a full -fledged RFID lab where it will experiment with not only the physics and shape of tags but also the way tags are placed on items. According to Wipro, it might set up more than one lab for experiments on specific industries like retailing and manufacturing.

All the top Indian IT companies are looking at RFID in terms of business consultation and system integration. Most of the bigger IT companies are working either on pilot projects or with clients abroad.

The other two RFID areas, application software or middleware and hardware, remain untapped, though Wipro executives say that Wipro might look at RFID hardware in the future.

Some of the RFID developments here are an outcome of the mandates specified by Wal-Mart in the US and Tesco and Metro in Europe. Wal-Mart has specified that its 100 top suppliers should be RFID compliant by January 2005.

A typical RFID system consists of a tag (with an in-built chip), a reader and data processing equipment such as a computer. The tag and reader communicate with one another over a radio frequency channel. Simple as it is though, the potential is huge. Not only can it replace bar codes at retail stores, but RFID can change the entire supply chain for companies.

No wonder then that the global market for RFID "� covering hardware, software and services "� has been pegged by the Wireless Data Research Group (WDRG)at $1 billion in 2003, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 23 per cent to $3 billion in 2007.

Exclaims Infotek Software's Patil: "We are looking at a three trillion unit market for RFDI tags by 2012."

Still, RFID is not new. It was born during World War II where it was used to differentiate between friends and foes. The technology as we know it now traces its origins to 1998 when a lab was set up at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to improve and modify it for commercial use.

"We set up the Auto-ID centre to look into RFID tags, our main aim being to bring down the $ 2 cost of the tags to a level where it was comparable with bar codes which cost 3.5 cents. The lab and research were co-sponsored by many, including the US Department of Defence (DoD) and Wal-Mart. In 2002, when it was clear that the technology would eventually reach that stage, the evolution of a business case for retailers and vendors became possible," says Sanjay Sarma, co-founder of Auto-ID lab at MIT and chief technology officer of OAT Systems, which produces software products for RFID.

But even as exporters rush to meet RFID requirements, they are facing technological hurdles. "Radio frequency does not travel through metals and liquids. This limits the readers and not all signals can be read. That's physics. There is nothing much that can be done about it. But instead of looking at integrated tagging solutions, we should design tags for particular products and applications. There is work happening in that area, but at the moment, they are too expensive. Once there is more volume in RFID, product specific tags will become a reality," says Sarma.

Another, possibly bigger, problem could hurt the faster adoption of RFID. This relates to the differing frequencies used for RFID in different parts of the world.

"We are in the process of working on standardising frequencies. These would in all probability be dual frequencies in the UHF band, 915-926 Mhz or 864-868 Mhz. The US already operates on these and most of Europe is in the process of shifting. We are involved in speaking with government bodies, including those in India, to open up these frequencies and make them available for RFID use, such that there is an uniform standard across the world," says Ravi Mathur, managing director of EAN India.

EAN is an industry group that aims to stimulate improvements in supply and demand chain management by developing open, global standards. It is also a co-founder of the main standards setting body in RFID, Electronic Product Code (EPC) Global. EAN India plans to open an Indian chapter of EPC this year.

Thirdly, all the hardware for RFID is now imported, which means that costs climb. Also, RFID tags cost between 5 and 20 cents each "� and that's if you're buying them in volume. That's far higher than bar code costs.

Says Pantaloon's Deshpande: "At Rs 7 per tag for hard tags (used for coding boxes) and Rs 8-20 for soft tags used on fabrics and individual items, it is expensive. Given their high price, the tags may not be used for low value items or perishable goods."

The point is echoed by TM Unnikrishnan, chief technology officer at Shoppers' Stop, the retail chain, which is considering implementing RFID: "In India, the technology has to justify the huge investments that will be required to set up the system. A bar code that costs less than Re 1 is comparatively inexpensive."

That's why both Pantaloon and Shoppers' Stop are planning to introduce RFID tagging for pallets and cases containing products, instead of for individual items themselves.

"It's a chicken and egg situation. When volumes increase, the cost will come down, and when the cost comes down volumes will increase. At the moment, only Indian exporters are looking at RFID and most of them are looking at it not for full fledged implementation but rather as things to be attached at the warehouse before being shipped out to the US," says Narasimha Subramaniam, head of Essae Technologies, a vendor of RFID hardware based in Bangalore.

He adds that though this does not affect implementation immediately since Wal-Mart calls for RFID only at the case and pallet level, it could prove to be a huge problem when it comes to unit tags.

Agrees Sarma: "Wal-Mart demands 100 per cent compliance in readability from cases and pallets beginning in January. Either companies can address this with a slap-and-ship mentality, where they hire a third party to simply affix tags at certain warehouses, or they can go the full length, establish a framework and integrate RFID into their own working. With the first, its easy to comply by the deadline. The second is a more difficult proposition."

Nobody working on RFID though has any doubts that these are just temporary problems that will be overcome. The point remains that exporters from India and elsewhere are fast deploying RFID to meet the mandates on time.

And that means opportunity is knocking on the doors of Indian IT companies. And many, including Wipro, Satyam, Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services, have already begun to seize the opportunity.

"RFID is not about single implementation. It is a technology that can change the mechanisms of the entire supply chain of a company. The supply chain is not an independent entity and any changes in it will touch upon all business processes. And that's where we would come in," says Mani Subramaniam, head of retail solutions at Wipro.

Still, not much work has been done in India as yet in the supply chain area. That doesn't discourage RFID buffs.

Says Subramaniam:"Five years back, how many landlines did we have? Today how many cellphone connections do we have? The absence of a good landline infrastructure made it possible for India to move to the next phase of technology. RFID is much like that and what can possibly stop the country from leapfrogging directly on to it?"

Additional Reporting with Renni Abraham and Richa Singh in Mumbai, Phalguna Jhandyala in Hyderabad.