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by Bill McBeath, Contributing Editor   | Abstract: | Mandates from major retailers and the Department of Defense forced many manufacturers to implement RFID technology with "slap and ship" components sooner than they would have on their own. But that's not the whole story. |
While many manufacturers are adopting RFID by force of mandate, others are seeking ways to use the technology to improve operations. In fact, mandates were the primary driver of implementation plans for only 34 percent of respondents to a recent ChainLink Research/Managing Automation survey of 275 manufacturing companies. Approximately 41 percent of respondents say both mandates and process improvements drove their implementations, while 25 percent point primarily to process improvements as the reason for implementing RFID. Despite RFID's high implementation costs, the majority of manufacturers polled are moving ahead with their deployment plans. About 10 percent have already implemented RFID, 16 percent are in the process, and more than 40 percent plan to implement RFID, the survey finds. Large manufacturers are slightly more aggressive in their implementation plans, but, surprisingly, company size does not have much impact on implementation pace for companies with less than $1 billion in revenues. In fact, smaller manufacturers -- with less than $25 million in revenue -- are implementing or planning to install RFID in slightly higher numbers than small to mid-size companies (with revenue in the $25 million to $1 billion range), according to the survey. [Click to continue] |