Extronics, the leading global designer and manufacturer of intrinsically safe and explosion-proof equipment will start selling Omni-ID passive RFID tags under their own name.

Extronics’ unrivalled understanding of wireless networking enables companies in process industries to unlock vital data from hazardous areas. Now, customers will be able to purchase Omni-ID RFID tags as part of Extronics’ asset and personnel tracking solutions.

“Recently, we have experienced a dramatic upsurge in inquiries from leading companies seeking effective tracking solutions for hazardous areas,” said John Hartley, Extronics’ managing director.

“Omni-ID offers the value and high-quality we required to add lower-cost, passive UHF RFID tags to our active RFID solutions and to provide the safest, wireless infrastructures for mining, petrochemical, process manufacturing, and similar dangerous work.”

Extronics Unveils Products at Hannover Messe Trade Show

The first products of this agreement will be unveiled in early April during Hannover Messe 2011 trade show in Germany. You can see Extronics in Hall 11, Stand B69 at Hanover Messe. Hannover Messe trade show Visit the Extronics booth.

Omni-ID Tags Designed for Harsh Conditions

“Extronics’ expert certification, co-branding, and distribution of Omni-ID’s innovative products ensures that industries challenged by harsh conditions, such as oil and gas, have the reliable tracking necessary to improve supply chain efficiency and asset visibility,” said Tony Kington, Omni-ID’s managing director. “We expect that this strategic partnership with

Extronics will accelerate the adoption of our passive UHF RFID tags in hazardous environments around the world.”

Download the Extronics Comparison Guide

RFID technology is maturing and presenting an array of options for unlocking new business value.

Ten years ago RFID solutions were limited by short read distances and high costs. The advent of passive UHF RFID and the EPC Class 1 Gen 2 protocol shifted the paradigm for users, opening up portal based solutions and global interoperability.

Three years ago Omni-ID expanded the reach of passive UHF by enabling real world solutions for applications that require tags to work on and around metal. Today on-metal tag technology has moved on yet further with an extensive range of different tag shapes, sizes and read distances available to meet the diverse needs of many.

One of the significant milestones of this technical innovation includes the launch of the world’s first truly global on metal passive UHF RFID tags.

This Poses the Question : Regional or Global?

To address this issue Omni-ID has developed an RFID Broadband Comparison white paper to address the following issues surrounding an RFID implementation:

• Will a small scale pilot with a regional tag be sufficient for the life of the asset?

• Is the geographic requirement the only factor in selecting global or regional – or is RF performance equally critical?

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Regionally tuned tags have a characteristic high peak which affords long read distance over a limited frequency range. Conversely, global tags afford less peak read range but cover the full global 860-960MHz UHF RFID spectrum. Global tags therefore support all geographies in one tag, with a relatively similar performance across all regions.

Plotted on a graph the two responses look very different.

To learn more, download the RFID Broadband white paper or visit our store to order RFID sample tags.

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Omni-ID surveyed attendees at the recent RFID Journal Live 2010 conference and focused on two key topics in the RFID industry.

Survey Question One

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Asked to identify the biggest impediment to full-scale RFID implementation in their company, attendees were roughly equally divided between these four: lack of understanding of the technology, no clear business case, senior management not convinced, and lack of budget.

Interestingly, few selected the choice “do not believe RFID will work in application”, suggesting that those who know what RFID can do are convinced that it will work for them.

At the same time, the major impediments appear to be a lack of understanding of RFID by the decision makers. Since numerous case studies have clearly identified how RFID can save money on the bottom line, the “lack of budget” response again demonstrates a poor understanding of RFID’s benefits.  Sounds like the RFID industry needs to keep working on educating businesses about the benefits and cost savings!

Survey Question Two

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Another survey question asked attendees to identify RFID revenue trends in 2010. Overwhelmingly, survey participants selected “revenue growth” over flat or decreasing revenue.

What Does This Mean for the RFID Industry?

This can be taken as yet another sign that global economic indicators are trending positive after a couple of tough years for everyone.

Survey Data Gathered: April 2010

Back in April 2008, the Omni-ID Prox™ was second runner-up for the “Best in Show” Award at RFID Journal Live. We were all happy to be in the top 3 with our new product. But I immediately said to Tom, “Want to be in the top 3 again? Then we need to make a 100-foot tag.”

Long Range RFID Test Results

It’s over a year later, and the 100-foot RFID tag is now a reality. It’s an incredible breakthrough that we call the “Ultra”™. Before the Ultra, the longest range for passive tags had been about 60 feet. No RFID tag even approached a 100-foot read range. Watch the video to see the test results.

The reason 100 feet is such a big deal is that for the first time, a passive tag can work in applications previously reserved for semi passive and active tags. The annoying thing about active tags is the battery. I don’t mind the source of power, but what bothers me is the maintenance. They fail just when you need them most. I was one of the first engineers using those little solar-powered calculators, and it always had power. Passive tags are the same way – there is no battery to fail, they just work!

Real World Uses for 100 Foot Read Range Passive Tags

I live in New York, and we East-Coasters have to pay to use freeways. We all have an EZPass on our car, and in it is an active RFID tag. Passive tags have never worked for that application before, because a) cars are made of metal, and b) the signal just wasn’t strong enough to read from a tollbooth to a moving car.  In the current market, windshield passive tags are already taking over, and the Ultra can handle just about any traffic pattern or transport situation. Clearly there is a savings here not to mention the batteries that don’t have to be recycled.  Imagine, 100,000 people with EZPass changing their batteries every two years, in ten years that’s 500,000 batteries that have to be recycled!

RFID enthusiasts are always looking for better ways to track assets.  The Ultra passive tag is a cheaper and greener solution, and it won’t take long for this great technology to find all kinds of applications.   I can imagine – and I’ve discussed with customers – some interesting new uses for this long-range, battery-free tag, including:

• Use by airlines on Unit Load Containers to enable RFID asset tracking in air transport
• Use on parade floats – RFID signals would trigger special effects as the float passes an area
• Tracking of vehicle rental fleets – RFID ensures accurate vehicle return information
• Use on large equipment for asset tracking and maintenance records
• Use on containers for port entry identification
• Use on Public transit vehicles for real time tracking, buses, trains, taxis, etc.
• Use on power stations, transformers, and transmission line poles, as long range ID
• Use in shipyard and oil rig asset tracking systems

I’m sure you can think of many more uses that haven’t yet occurred to me!

Andre Coté

CTO and Vice President of Product Management

In 2009, Omni-ID launched a suite of industrial RFID products, including the new Max Pro tag, Max HD tag, and the Ultra.

As the company’s CTO and VP of Product Development, I’d like to say a few words about how and why these products were developed. Omni-ID has a development team in the UK that includes scientists, engineers, and product developers. This is the team that developed the Prox, and it’s their expertise that has taken our technology to the next level.

VIDEO: See How It Works

Modeling Software for RFID Design Optimization

Our scientists have created world-class modeling software. It took some time to build, but with this software, we can truly understand every aspect of how our RFID tags work, including each point where signal is lost. Using this modeling software, we were able to test and optimize designs for minimal signal loss – and maximum read range. Really, this software is what enabled us to take advantage of the plasmonic structure and develop tags with such long read ranges. It’s also the modeling software that has allowed us to create a broadband tag.

Once our scientists have a good product concept model, they hand it to our team of engineers and product developers, who use the latest materials and design techniques to make the model work. Our line of industrial tags has an extremely robust design. We use silicon grommets between the inner core and the polycarbonate case, isolating it from shock and vibe and from heat transfer. Once these products are closed up, you can throw them around, drive over them, or whatever, and they won’t be damaged. We could have called the largest of these tags “The Tank” but marketing wouldn’t allow it.

Broadband Capability in Industrial-Strength RFID Tags

On top of the amazing read range and rugged design, two of our industrial tags have broadband capability. We have several patents pending on the dielectric core and the antenna design. It’s these two technologies, working together in an optimized design, which enabled us to create a tag with a broadband RF range instead of a single peak. Effective broadband read range on metal for a passive tag – another first for our industry.

The credit for these new developments belongs with our stellar development team, and I’d like to thank them publicly for the work they’ve done. I doubt, however, that they’ll come and read this blog – they’re already heads-down, working on our next set of products!

Andre Coté

CTO and Vice President of Product Management

Innovation in our industry has to do with technology and products.

New inventions emerge because someone discovered something cool. But cool technology, in itself, is not enough to create value. The value of a new product or technology depends also on the technology’s utility and cost – and whether it solves a business problem.

I’ve been talking a lot about the term “value innovation”. This term is not new – it comes from an excellent book called Blue Ocean Strategy. Value innovation means driving innovation in ways that create value. The book discusses how one can use value innovation to create new market space, or a blue ocean, thereby making the competition irrelevant.

Creating New Markets

When Omni-ID released its first products a few years ago, we used blue ocean strategy to target the IT asset management market. The IT industry wasn’t using RFID at all, with good reason. At that time, RFID tags basically didn’t work in environments like a data center, which is full of metal. What’s more, IT equipment is covered with switches, indicators, and airflow grids, so there was no room for the large tags commonly used at that time.

Our technology created value for the IT industry. Because our technology creates a strong read range for the size of our tag, we were able to create an RFID tag, the Omni-ID Prox ™, with a small enough footprint, and a low enough profile, to fit on the surface of almost any electronic asset. The Prox has a read range of 8 feet in the US and is only 35mm x 10mm x 4mm, a size/read range combination that was unheard of when it was released. And because the Prox is balanced – meaning it works both on and off metal – it can be used on the complex variety of metal and plastic assets throughout the data center. We were able to offer a solution at a price point that worked for the industry, enabling them to manage thousands of data center assets more efficiently, and at lower cost, than they could without our technology.

Continued Value Innovation

Working closely with our customers, we have continued to create value for the IT industry. When customers needed a way to attach tags to a gridded surface or to cables, we developed the OmniTether attachment option. When they asked us for help with deploying tens of thousands of RFID tags, we developed the OnDemand ™ deployment solution, becoming the only on-metal RFID tag vendor with a solution for commissioning RFID tags at the customer site.

Eventually, RFID tags will be embedded in IT assets during the manufacturing process, and commissioning will take place in the supply chain. Omni-ID is already talking with IT manufacturers about this value innovation.

In the last year, competitors have joined us in the IT asset management market, and the IT industry can choose from several RFID tag vendors. A competitive playing field adds even more value for that industry, as it drives down costs.

For Omni-ID, however, it’s a signal for more value innovation. Through value innovation, we will continue to serve our existing markets, and also enter new markets, creating new blue oceans.

In a future blog post, our CTO, Andre Cote, will share with you a new form factor for a new market – our latest value innovation.

The use of RFID for precision asset tracking may have started out in the private business sector, but the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) is now a heavy RFID user.

Omni-ID and RFID Journal are sponsoring an “RFID in Defense” virtual conference, featuring presentations by current U.S. military experts in the automatic identification technology (AIT) field along with RFID manufacturers.

Register for the free Webinar

DOD Automatic Identification Technology Update

The webinar begins with David Blackford of the United States Transportation Command providing an overview of the challenges and improvements regarding AIT and RFID technologies (both active and passive) as used by the DOD and USTRANSCOM’s use of satellite technology.

Why RFID Is Mission-Critical for Improved Asset Visibility in the DOD

Mary Ann Wagner, President, XIO Strategies, shares research-based findings, DOD client success stories, key challenges in RFID deployment within the industry and the critical role that RFID plays in achieving improved asset visibility. End users will gain an understanding of the “here and now,” as well as future opportunities to leverage RFID and other automatic-identification technologies (AIT) to improve the DOD’s operations.

Why Passive RFID Makes Sense for DOD Asset-Tracking and Logistics Applications

Major-General Hawthorne L. Proctor (Retired), US Army, and Andre Coté of Omni-ID discuss how to select the right RFID technology and tag for the application. They will cover the expected lifespan of RFID tags, the environment, read-distance requirements, the movement of assets between facilities and geographic regions and cost considerations.

The Next Phase of AIT-enabled Distribution at the DLA

Mark Lieberman, U.S. Defense Logistics Agency, discusses how by leveraging the supply chain relationships of its suppliers and customers, using new and exciting technologies and integrating RFID into more of its logistics footprint and processes, the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) will soon provide improved visibility beyond just receiving.

Navy AIT: Turning a Vision of RFID-Enabled Operations Into Reality

Robert Bacon and Mike Slocum discuss how the Navy is addressing complex Information Assurance (IA) and NMCI requirements, as well as the development of an enterprise architecture, and how it tested the use of passive RFID on a Navy vessel.

Mobile Asset Tracking—The Case for RFID

Jeff Tazelaar, Lowry Computer Products explains how improvements in accuracy and a reduction of audit times are but a few of the proven benefits of deploying RFID for asset control for IT property, weapon systems, property, plant and equipment, and document tracking.

Asset Management in the U.S. Air Force: Using RFID in the Global Supply Chain

Mark Reboulet explains the USAF’s passive RFID program with emphasis on employing the technology to support the tracking of critical assets, as well as an integrated approach between passive RFID, bar codes and wireless handheld terminals in base supply.

Andre Coté

CTO and VP of Product Management
Omni-ID

Register for the free Webinar

The first quarter of 2009 was difficult for many companies in our industry. And it was a tough quarter for Omni-ID as well.

In our second quarter, however, we saw a significant uptick in business – resulting in the best revenue quarter in our 2-year history. We saw not only an increase in the number of orders, but also in the size of orders – moving from tens of thousands of RFID tags to hundreds of thousands. And we’re seeing a lot of activity for Q3 and Q4. So this leads me to feel cautiously optimistic about the second half of this year – for Omni-ID, and for the RFID industry as a whole.

“So, does this mean that the economic downturn has hit the “tipping point”? And is this increase in activity an indication that the RFID industry has crossed the chasm into the mainstream global economy?”

Well, I think it is too early to call it an economic recovery. And, no, I don’t think that I would say that as an industry that we’ve crossed the chasm. But from my perspective, I am seeing more and more business pragmatists getting involved in RFID. They are looking to address real mainstream business issues and discovering that RFID can address these issues. . . and in the process RFID is bringing real value to their business. As a result, people are beginning to turn to RFID for practical business solutions, not just cool technology.

I just returned from a week-long visit to the East Coast, meeting with customers and partners, and they echoed my cautious optimism. As a group, we’re upbeat about a strong second half leading into 2010.

Given this perspective, the next question is: is Omni-ID ready? My answer is a resounding, “yes!” We’ve taken a number of key steps during the downturn to prepare for an upturn in the business. In a tribute to the strength of our technology and products, Omni-ID closed a sizeable Series C round of funding in February of this year – at a time when almost no companies were being funded. This investment has allowed us to strengthen our company in several significant ways:

Technology and Products

We have a roadmap of new RFID tags coming out over the next several months, including some significant product announcements coming in September. These new products are designed around value innovation – technological innovation that provides a leap in value for customers that opens up new market space for innovative companies like Omni-ID. I’ll talk more about value innovation in a future blog.

Capacity and Quality

Just recently, we announced our new manufacturing subsidiary, located in Quingdao, China. This facility will offer not only greater production capacity but also tighter control over the manufacturing process, resulting in continued quality improvements.

Partnerships and Programs

This past year, we announced some pretty significant partnerships with IBM and Mitsubishi, two highly-selective global powerhouses. Over the coming year, we look forward to developing those partnerships further as well as announcing new ones. Through these partnerships, we are part of total solution programs that address real world customer problems and bring more value to businesses.

Markets and Customers

As a startup, we’ve been focused to date on a few select markets, including IT asset tracking, where we are viewed as the leading passive UHF RFID company in this expanding market. We’re well-positioned and strong enough now to expand and aggressively enter new markets, where we believe our new product offerings provide innovation and value to customers.

With so many things ahead, the timing is perfect to begin an Omni-ID blog. As we roll out new products, partnerships and programs, my colleagues at Omni-ID, Stan Drobac and Andre Cote, and I will be sharing with you our personal thoughts on the industry and Omni-ID’s value innovation. We look forward to a continuing dialogue with you, our readers!