Hybrid Tag Includes Active RFID, GPS, Satellite and Sensors

There are auto-ID systems currently on the market that support cellular and satellite communications, as well as others that leverage active RFID and satellite technology. The DOD, for example, recently deployed a solution leveraging devices that act like RFID tags and communicate via satellite and cellular communications, that is helping ensure troops in Iraq receive their necessary supplies. This is being achieved thanks to a remote tracking solution implemented and managed by Impeva Labs, a provider of asset-management systems, and logistics provider Agility (see U.S. Army Achieves Real-Time Visibility of Supply Trucks Traveling in the Middle East).

In addition, agriculture technology firm TekVet, offers an RFID cattle-tracking system that utilizes active 418 MHz RFID tags, sensors that monitor an animal's internal temperature and transceivers to transmit each tag's unique serial number, as along with the animal's temperature, to an Internet server hosted by IBM. Communication between the transceivers, which can be attached to poles or other fixed structures, and the Internet server is conducted via a 900 MHz private satellite communication network (see TekVet-IBM Cattle Tracker Uses Active RFID Tags, Satellite Communication).

There have also been prototype hybrid tags that combine RFID and satellite communications. In 2005, in fact, the Department of Defense tested a version that included a Savi active tag (see DOD Tries Tags That Phone Home).

A year ago, Siemens IT Solutions and Services conducted a proof-of-technology test on a solution that combined active RFID transponders and sensors with GSM and GPRS telecommunications technology installed on ships. The solution communicated the RFID and sensor data to a satellite telecommunications service operated by Inmarsat (see Cargo-Tracking System Combines RFID, Sensors, GSM and Satellite).

The new ST-694 tag is still a few months away from commercial availability, and pricing has yet to be determined. The tag will first have to undergo a series of tests to ensure it meets DOD requirements, including environmental tests and Hazards of Electromagnetic Radiation to Ordnance (HERO) testing to make sure the system won't accidentally detonate explosives. Once that has been completed, Numerex, Savi and USTRANSCOM intend to deploy the tags in a variety of military exercises and environments, as part of concept-of-operations testing.

"Testing in the lab can be quite extensive," Parent indicates, "but is never as thorough as testing in the real world."