SASUM, the social services unit of Portugal’s Minho University, is tracking its inventory of furnishings, electronics and sporting goods for the college’s 15,000 students, using a radio frequency identification system provided by Creativesystems. SASUM is responsible for managing the university’s dormitories and other campus residences, as well as food service, sports facilities and the student union building. In this role, SASUM is in charge of furnishings, such as tables, beds, laptops and devices used by students at the school.
SASUM has traditionally sent staff members to conduct manual inventory counts on a periodic basis of the furnishings and equipment within its dorm rooms, restaurants and lounges. This task could take days to complete for a large fleet of employees who must record room numbers, along with serial numbers or descriptions of the items within those rooms. If anything appears to be missing or damaged, that detail must be manually recorded as well.
If an item such as a lamp or desk is discovered to be missing, locating it elsewhere could be difficult or impossible.
The university’s IT department asked SASUM to optimize this process, in an effort to reduce the risk of errors, decrease labor costs associated with inventory checks, and make it easier to locate missing items. “As we knew the concept of RFID, we were seeking companies that offered the desired service,” says Maurício da Costa Queiroz, SASUM’s IT director.
According to da Costa Queiroz, SASUM informed Creativesystems that it required a solution that would be easy for workers to use, and that could be integrated with its enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. Ultimately, he says, it decided that Creativesystems’ Creative.Inventory solution would meet its needs. During this past summer, the university tagged 20,000 assets with adhesive paper labels containing Alien Technology Short passive EPC Gen 2 tags, measuring 3 inches by 1 inch. It then began tracking the assets in September, says Pedro França, Creativesystems’ innovation director. The Creative.Inventory software resides on SAMSUM’s back-end system, managing read data and then sharing that information with the ERP inventory-management system.When performing an inventory count, staff members can utilize two ATID AT870 handheld ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) RFID readers loaded with inventory data for each room from the Creative.Inventory software, which collects that information from the ERP system. That data is downloaded to the handheld device, using a cradle cabled to a computer running the software. This process can also be accomplished via a Wi-Fi connection. However, França says, Wi-Fi connectivity could be limited in some areas, such as within locker or storage rooms.
A user employs the software’s drop-down menu to select the area in which he or she is conducting an inventory count, and then waves the reader around that area, indicating once he or she is finished. The system can display data regarding items linked to the ID numbers of the tags that were read, as well as any goods that are deemed to be missing. In the event that a product appears to be damaged or in need of servicing, that data can be input into the handheld as well, to be viewed by SASUM’s management.
Staff members can also use the reader to search for missing items. As workers continue to conduct inventory sweeps of each room, the system can alert them when a lost item is found, or set the reader to Geiger counter mode, which will cause it to sound an alert if the specific asset sought is located.
Since the system’s installation, SASUM has conducted tests of the technology by using the handhelds to read tagged items at various campus locations, but it has yet to perform a full inventory count. To date, SASUM has not yet determined when it expects to achieve a return on its investment. “The financial return will be slow,” says da Costa Queiroz, since inventories are conducted only periodically. Thus, labor costs will occur only during those periodic inventory checks. “From the point of view of managing, the return will be very quick,” he states, noting that it provides greater information more quickly, thereby offering a more accurate view of where specific inventory items are located. “With this new system, we can perform inventories… more effectively.” So far, he says, the technology “has fulfilled our expectations.”