ABSTRACT
Automatic identification data capture (AIDC) technologies are becoming increasingly important in the management of supply chain, manufacturing flow management, mobile asset tracking, inventory management, warehousing, and any application where physical items move through location on time. This chapter presents a comparative basis for the creation of on AIDC infrastructure via radio frequency identification (RFID) versus other technologies, such as barcode and sensor technologies. Barcode, RFID, sensor, magnetic strip, integrated circuit card, optic character recognition, voice recognition, fingerprint, and optical strip are identification technologies that are being used in the enterprise environment. The combination of RFID and sensor technology adds additional value to the enterprise operations. The emerging RFID technology brings significant new opportunities as well as challenges to the AIDC infrastructure. A combination of RFID technology and computing technology that brings value to a business or engineering process is called a RFID system.
