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by Beth Stackpole, Contributing Editor   | Abstract: | SAP and Kimberly-Clark are building solutions around new RFID-enabled business processes to drive value for retailers, CPG manufacturers, and customers. |
Want to see the future of RFID-enabled business processes? Check out what's going on at Kimberly-Clark Corp., a $15 billion maker of paper-based consumer products. While the industry hashes out standards and experiments with tags and other RFID building blocks, Kimberly-Clark (Irving, TX) and partner SAP AG (Walldorf, Germany) are pushing the technology to the next level, leveraging the data collected by the budding RFID (radio frequency identification) infrastructure to inject greater visibility and zero latency into a new set of business processes. The partners plan to go live this quarter with the first deliverable in their RFID collaboration: Electronic Proof of Delivery (E-POD), which aims to address the longstanding and widespread problem of invoice reconciliation between consumer products manufacturers and retailers. After that, the partners will turn their attention to additional pilots to enable new RFID business processes around promotion management, retail distribution support, out-of-stock reduction, and a handful of other areas, according to officials at both companies. Kimberly-Clark has long been an RFID pioneer among consumer product goods (CPG) manufacturers. The company was among the first to respond to mandates put forth by retail mega giants like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to tag merchandise so it can be monitored throughout the supply chain. In April 2004, Kimberly-Clark became the first U.S. company to ship an item with an electronic product code (EPC) tag. Additionally, it plays an active role in EPCglobal Inc., the international organization promoting RFID standards, and has constructed a 5,000-square-foot warehouse for the sole purpose of testing all of its RFID-related efforts. [Click to continue] |