As a young journalist, I learned that the more research and preparation I did before sitting down to write an article, the better the story would turn out. It’s a lesson that has served me well throughout my life, whether it has involved organizing a big event like RFID Journal LIVE! or doing a home-improvement project.
I find it odd, therefore, that so many companies seem to want to perform RFID or other Internet of Things (IoT) deployments quickly and cheaply with little or no preparation. Case in point: A reader recently emailed me looking to know which RFID reader could deliver 100 percent read rates. A little research would have led him to understand that achieving high read rates depends on a number of factors, including choosing the right tag, tag placement, reader and reader antenna setup (see Which RFID Reader Would Give Us 100 Percent Read Rates?).
Turning to your current barcode technology supplier or an IT systems integrator for an RFID deployment might be easy, but it’s almost always a mistake. Even asking an experienced company to deploy an RFID solution without at least some internal preparation is probably asking for trouble.
Why shouldn’t you turn to your barcode solution provider for RFID? Well, in most cases they won’t have a deep knowledge of RFID, so you will wind up spending a lot of money going in the wrong direction. Often, projects burn money trying to fix issues that a good integrator would have avoided, and eventually the company abandons the project. Even with a skilled integrator, a little knowledge of RFID and other IoT technologies is valuable.
Every company is different, and RFID and other IoT solutions should be used to support your existing business processes and further your competitive advantage. A good RFID systems integrator will understand RFID and know how to deploy it, but it won’t know your company, your processes or your business strategy. By learning what RFID can and cannot do, a business can better communicate its needs and expectations and work collaboratively with an integrator toward creating a solution that will meet its needs and deliver a return on investment.
Executives do not need to be RFID experts, but having a little knowledge means you won’t be taken advantage of. Too often, I see companies using systems integrators that know barcode technology well but do not understand the first thing about RFID. In such a scenario, the integrator ends up pushing a solution that won’t work, or that will work for one narrow application but cannot be expanded to other use cases.
I’ve seen a lot of projects go wrong. I receive emails all the time from people who have not spent any time reading RFID Journal, have not attended LIVE! and have thus wasted tens of thousands of dollars before realizing they were on the wrong track. I’m always happy to help these people, but I would really like to see them help themselves by seeking out basic knowledge of RFID so they can lead a successful deployment.
Mark Roberti is the founder and editor of RFID Journal.