The leading RFID vendor, Alien Technology, recently announced to offer a new software, Intelligent Tag Radar (ITR), designed for the ALR-9900, ALR-9800 and ALR-8800 Enterprise-Class reader platform.
According to Alien, ITR is the first RFID reader software to provide comprehensive information about the position and direction of UHF RFID tags in addition to the contents of the tag memory.
Major features in the Intelligent Tag Radar reader platform list as follows:
"With this new ITR platform, our partners and their customers can derive new value from their existing investments in RFID," said Scot Stelter, director of reader product marketing with Alien Technology. "This extension of the Alien Reader Protocol enables our partners to address unsolved business problems using existing Alien readers and Gen 2 tags as well as to expand RFID into new growth applications and segments."
Examples of ITR Applications:
ITR for Airline Baggage and Manufacturing
One of the challenges of using RFID with conveyor belts is the difficulty in isolating individual tagged objects as they pass the antenna. Standard solutions to this problem entail reducing conveyor speed or creating greater separation between tagged objects. ITR-Singulation enables the isolation of the one tag that is "top-dead-center" with respect to the antenna. This allows the system to keep track of the order of the tagged objects and to take specific action with respect to each one. Alien subsidiary Quatrotec is using ITR, in addition to its airport RFID solution, in baggage handling applications being evaluated now by several airports and baggage handling companies.
ITR for Retail
Retail users of RFID need to know not only that a given reader has detected a certain tag, but in which direction the tag is traveling when it was detected. Knowing whether a case of product has moved from the back room to the store floor or the reverse helps provide more accurate inventory information and supplements shrinkage control systems. Retailers will also be able to discern moving inventory items from stationary ones with ITR-Velocity. This information provides retailers with timely and specific information on the product the user is examining, while collecting data about how long the customer interacted with the item. This valuable marketing data will help retailers to optimize merchandizing displays and to know which products are hot in real time.
ITR for Asset Tracking
In many asset-tracking applications, passive RFID is replacing the more expensive active RFID solution. ITR-Range enables the system to isolate the tag to a given zone, which in many cases is sufficient precision for the user, who retains all of the cost benefits of passive RFID. Alien developed this application to aid in the loading process for cargo helicopters.
"The availability of Alien's ITR software points to continued passive UHF application enablement in the industry," said Michael Liard, research director for RFID and contactless technologies and markets at ABI Research. "The ability to understand where an item is going, where its exact location is among other items, while on a conveyer or passing through a read zone, opens up the door for application use of RFID that's well beyond the supply chain, manufacturing and simple asset tracking. Enterprises such as airlines and airports, large package and postal service companies, and others can benefit from the use of the Intelligent Tag Radar."
Alien's software for the patent pending ITR can be downloaded by existing and new customers starting June 30 from the Alien Partner Portal. The new firmware includes an updated Software Development Kit with sample code for several of the applications described above.
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