RFID Journal LIVE! was recently nominated by Folio magazine as one of the three best conferences and expositions produced by a magazine publisher. We attended a breakfast at which the winner, O, The Oprah Magazine, was announced. We got the bronze. It was nice to be recognized, but it left me wondering why O deserved top honors and how we could learn from it.
RFID Journal handles its awards differently. We forgo the drama of opening an envelope and announcing our winners at RFID Journal LIVE! Instead, we announce the winners in our end-user category beforehand, so we can invite them to speak at the event. That way, attendees not only learn why each won but also gain valuable insights through hearing firsthand from the winners about their use of RFID.
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We gave out three awards to end users: Airbus won for Best RFID Implementation; Agence métropolitaine de transport (AMT), Montreal’s mass transit provider, won for Best Use of RFID in a Service; and InterfaceFlor, the world’s largest manufacturer of carpet tiles, won for Most Innovative Use of RFID. This issue includes case studies of each deployment because, again, our goal is not simply to hand out nice pieces of Steuben Glass, but to use the awards to showcase what these companies are doing right.
This year, we introduced an award for the best new product exhibited at RFID Journal LIVE! We asked attendees to watch presentations by 10 Best in Show Award finalists and tell us if the products delivered business value, broke new ground from a technical standpoint, were innovative and so on. The Mojix STAR system, which extends the capabilities of passive UHF systems, received consistently high scores in all categories from attendees. Our independent panel of judges concurred; they were nearly unanimous in choosing the STAR system as the best new product.
We’re also debuting a new department in this issue—The RFID Market—that will provide insights into the state of RFID adoption. RFID Journal is in a unique position in the RFID industry: While end users and vendors see only a slice of the market, we collect a great deal of statistical and anecdotal information that gives us a broad view and enables us to spot trends. I believe that good data on where the market stands today will help all companies make smart business decisions related to RFID.
I hope Folio nominates RFID Journal LIVE! for an award next year, and that we win—because all of us at RFID Journal work awfully hard 365 days a year to put on a great event for three days. But even if we don’t, I’ll still feel like a winner, because I know we’re delivering valuable information in a market where many end users are still struggling to figure out how and where to use RFID to benefit their business.