Where is the ROI from RFID? For many firms considering RFID, it is simply because a regulator or their customer has "asked" them to use RFID. Alternatively, some of their competitors have deployed RFID and they are wondering if they should deploy it too. So:

• What are firms like Wal-Mart in America gaining by using RFID? Can we gain the same advantage?
• Can we improve our processes without RFID? Just with better barcodes and procedures?
• Are we too small for RFID?
• Can we deploy just an internal RFID solution?
• Do we even have a place for RFID in our organisation?

Simply dismissing RFID is no longer an alternative. The technology is mature enough for a "typical end user" to deploy (see dates at the end of this section for "widely deployed" predictions). End users should now be considering when and not if they should be deploying RFID.

RFID in your system allows you to use, for example, real-time location of assets within a building. This includes everything from books removed from your library to employees to spare parts. Valuable commodities such as a coil of steel, roll or paper or even a mobile vessel to hold milk or a pharmaceutical product can benefit from RFID tagging. The manufacturing control system knows where the item is, what it contains, where it came from and where it is going. The truck driver or crane operator can pin point a target to move within a large warehouse and substantially reduce the chance of shipping the wrong product to an end user. With the mobile vessel application, the user can tag the vessel as cleaned (including an expiry date), full or dirty (as required) and reduce the chances of product contamination or user error (such as traditional measures of coloured labels that can be misplaced). A firm could just be tagging its own assets (forklift trucks, robots or welding equipment) for improved calibration, maintenance and safety reasons.

RFID will give you:

• Compliance to regulations or customer rules (e.g., electronic pedigree);
• Protect the integrity of your product (and protect your firms' good name);
• Product safety;
• Visibility in the supply chain (where is it or what is it?);
• Asset and supply chain management;
• MES, ERP improvements (including "Process Analytics");
• Supply chain and goods handling cost reduction, efficiency improvement;
• Improved supply chain and goods handling security.

Passive solutions are currently in the US$0.30 per tag range (depending on quantities) and active solutions start at US$5.00 per tag (again, depending on quantities, however top tag prices can easily reach US$100.00 per tag for specialised applications).

So, even if your firm is being forced to use RFID, there may be a significant ROI, even in just reducing scrap, rework or other losses.

RFID experts predict that major industry segments will be able to deploy practical RFID solutions as follows:

• Defence - 2005;
• Explosives - 2006;
• Retail - 2007-2008;
• Secure Goods Handling - 2008-2009;
• Consumer Products - 2008-2010;
• Life Sciences - 2009-2011;
• Aviation - 2011-2013.