Barcodes are yesterday’s news, but RFID is the technology of tomorrow. RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification, an identification technology based on electronic data exchange. With this technology you can quickly pinpoint the location of a product anywhere in your company without having to handle each item individually. After all, time is money! At ZOW in Bad Salzuflen from 9-12 February 2009, Horst Koitka, the managing director of Löhne-based IT company abaco, will be demonstrating together with his partners how RFID technology works. At the RFID Factory in Hall 19, exhibitors and visitors alike can discover the benefits of this innovative technology.
RFID is already in widespread use in other industries but is still relatively new in the furniture sector. Yet another reason to give space to this fascinating technology at ZOW in Bad Salzuflen, the innovation show for the furniture and interior design industry. The demonstration that Horst Koitka and his partners plan to give in Hall 19 is on an impressive scale. The RFID Factory is about 30 m long and traces the route taken by a furniture item through the supply chain, from the supplier through industry to the trade, including transport by a haulage company. The demonstration will feature various charge carriers such as palettes, wire mesh cages and FurniBoxes which have to be detected at so-called ‘gates’ using RFID. Visitors are guided through the RFID Factory following the route laid out by the gates.
Tagged products can be tracked seamlessly throughout the entire supply chain, enhancing the company’s process efficiency. This applies to storage and logistics, parts tracking and production monitoring, dispatch and route planning, warranties and complaints handling, service and maintenance, disposal and recycling, and quality control. An important part of the process is incorporating suppliers into the system so that products can be tracked seamlessly from one end of the supply chain to the other. This is currently one of the major issues in the furniture industry.
