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Conference Agenda
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October 24, 2012 October 25, 2012
October 24, 2012Back to Top| 15:00 | General Session:
Welcome and Introduction
| | 15:15 | General Session:
Railroad Streamlines Operations With RFID
A European-based railroad operator is employing EPC Gen 2 RFID technology to track 10,000 rail-freight wagons, locomotives and passenger cars, thereby helping the company and its subsidiary to manage rail cars and work processes within its rail yards. The use of RFID-enabled technology has improved the efficiency of its rail-yard processes, better managed their rail-car inventory and maintenance orders, and provide improved customer service by delivering detailed information to customers regarding which shipments have arrived, and when. Learn how personnel can identify wagons automatically, and at a distance, by allowing workers to use handheld readers while they walk alongside a train and use the devices to interrogate each rail car's tags. Additionally, hear how workers can confirm that the cars are located behind the correct locomotive, and in the intended order, even after wagons have been shifted and a new train has been assembled within the yard.
Takeaways:
• The use of the RFID system to improve yard-management by automating work orders, speeding up the process of reporting car defects and ensuring correct train composition
• How the switch from a manual system to an automated one has saved the firm labor costs | | 16:00 | General Session:
The Benefits of Using RFID to Achieve Work-in-Process Visibility
Every manufacturer wants to know the status and location of all work-in-process (WIP). RFID can help, but companies also need the ability to identify each item and ensure its status is updated in real time. This session will explain the infrastructure required to track WIP in real time to achieve just-in-time manufacturing. Learn how to employ RFID to become a lean manufacturer, reducing costs and increasing profitability.
| | 16:45 | General Session:
Tracking and Tracing Vehicles With RFID
One of the world's biggest manufacturer of commercial vehicles—and one of the largest producers of premium cars—has embarked on a project to provide information transparency along the distribution chain. In this session, the automotive original equipment manufacturer (OEM) will share the results of the RFID installation within its rework area. Hear why the use of the track-and-trace system is of central importance in the creation of industry standards for enterprise-wide deployment.
Takeaways:
• How RFID technology is being used throughout the logistics network
• How the OEM overcame the challenge of installing the system within an area containing metal obstructions | | 17:30 | Reception on Exhibit Floor
| | 19:00 | Reception Ends
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October 25, 2012Back to Top| 08:30 | Continental Breakfast
| | 09:00 | General Session:
Welcome Back and Introduction
| | 09:15 | General Session:
Ten Years of Putting RFID to Work—Lessons Learned From Experienced End Users
RFID deployments sometimes involve physics challenges, business process change, IT integration and other factors that must be addressed in order to achieve success. Our panelists were among RFID's early adopters, and they now have many years of experience with the technology. During this probing panel discussion, the speakers will reveal what they've learned—often the hard way. Find out how to avoid common pitfalls, how to address challenges and how to get an entire organization behind an RFID project.
| | 10:00 | General Session:
Achieving Product Traceability While Reducing Costs
Today's companies are under pressure to ensure the safety and integrity of their products, to comply with ever more strict regulations, and to act swiftly in the case of adverse unforeseen events. Traceability has become essential to protecting your brand, customers and relationships. Learn how to achieve end-to-end traceability, from manufacturing inputs—raw materials, components, machines, labor and processes—through distribution and getting products into the hands of end users. What's more, hear how traceability data can reduce inventory-management costs.
| | 10:30 | General Session:
RFID Delivers Visibility and Improved ROI for CPG Manufacturers
An organization established by Norwegian consumer products goods (CPG) manufacturers and retailers to manage a nationwide pool of pallets is transitioning to plastic pallets and totes with embedded UHF RFID tags. This allows companies to track when tagged pallets are packed, shipped, received at distribution centers and shipped again to retailers. The firm is also utilizing RFID within its own operations. Learn how the RFID pallet program is delivering real supply chain benefits to CPG companies.
Takeaways:
• How RFID handheld interrogators and fixed reader portals are being used to improve visibility at the factories, as well as at two distribution centers
• How pallet users benefit, since the RFID system ensures that they don't keep the pallets in storage any longer than necessary, thereby reducing leasing fees | | 11:15 | Networking Break on Exhibit Floor
| | | 11:45—Track Sessions | |  Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
Tracking Production and Shipping in Harsh Environments
A Norwegian company that manufactures products for roofing, flooring and other applications is using RFID technology to track heavy, tough-to-move loads in one of the world's harshest weather environments. The challenging setting, as well as more conventional business demands, created a simple need for the firm to quickly and accurately track slate-bearing pallets at its production facility, in order to identify products in all weather conditions, view accurate stock inventory data in real time, speed production and shipping processes, and eliminate shipping errors caused by product misidentification. Learn how the company is tracking its products in real time, and how it is maintaining an accurate inventory count without human intervention. Additionally, hear how managers are updated automatically when production work on each pallet is completed, thereby clearing the way for an order to be released to storage or shipping. Forklift operators are also notified automatically that a pallet is ready to be picked up from the production area and moved to a long- or short-term holding area.
Takeaways:
• The importance of choosing an RFID system that could tolerate all anticipated weather conditions, without any noticeable performance drop-off
• How the system encourages production employees to work more efficiently | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
RFID Drives Up Efficiencies at Manufacturing Plant
A global manufacturer of power and automation equipment for utility and industrial companies is employing radio frequency identification at its factory in Finland, to better track outbound shipments of approximately 200,000 drives per year. The firm implemented the RFID system to replace its manual shipping processes, enabling it to reduce outbound shipping errors and utilize a forwarding operator to take over the task of logistics and warehousing. Learn how the company was able to free up space at its factory in order to expand its production capacity.
Takeaways:
• How the firm is using RFID to reduce the risk involved in outsourcing some of its logistics and warehousing tasks
• Future plans to introduce item-level tracking for the components that make up the drives | | | 12:30—Track Sessions | | Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
Tracking the Temperatures of Super-Chilled Meat Products With RFID
A Norweigian government research council recently funded a project to improve and secure marine and agricultural food processing within that country. The project included plans to use technology to improve hygiene, cold chains and fresh-food traceability. The project was designed to study the ability of RFID sensor tags to track the temperatures of fresh legs of lamb as they were transported by truck from slaughterhouse to distribution center. Although the practice of super-chilling food products below the freezing point to stop bacteria growth is fairly commonplace with fish, few meat producers or companies in the supply chain super-chill meat because the temperature threshold is very tight. Temperatures must remain colder than 0 degrees Celsius, but not fall below -1.7 degrees Celsius, or else the quality of the fresh meat could degrade. Learn how RFID technology was used to track the temperatures of super-chilled meat products being transported from an abattoir to a distribution center in Norway.
Takeaways:
• The challenges faced during the project, including hardware-related problems
• Results, including whether the proper temperatures were maintained within the truck, and whether the online monitoring was found to be beneficial. | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
RFID Helps Maintain Factory Infrastructure
A manufacturer of automotive transmissions and chassis is employing radio frequency identification to improve the maintenance of motors that run its production machinery at one of its factories. After having a good experience using passive ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) tags to improve the management of parts at another plant, the company tagged the 6,000 motors that run its production machinery and conveyor systems. These motors must be maintained and serviced at regular intervals—typically, every two to three months—to ensure that production equipment continues running. Hear how workers use RFID to identify and record the motors' repair histories.
Takeaways:
• How RFID reduces overall maintenance costs by decreasing the amount of time workers must search for the proper motor to repair, as well as related maintenance histories
• The importance of employing tags that can stand up to wear and tear from handling and cleaning within a harsh industrial environment | | 13:15 | Lunch on Exhibit Floor
| | | 14:30—Track Sessions | | Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
Psychiatric Ward Uses RFID-based Alarms to Increase Security
A Finnish hospital is using a system consisting of battery-powered tags, as well as routers that receive signals from those tags. Personnel at the facility use the specially designed tags to alert supervisors if they find themselves in a threatening situation within the ward. The palm-sized, battery-powered tags include a button that an employee can push if he or she needs help, causing the tag to transmit an alarm signal encoded with a unique serial number identifying the individual to whom the tag was issued. The device's signal is transmitted to all routers within the vicinity, for reliability and positioning purposes. The signal that the tag sends is time-stamped, indicating to supervisors the exact time that the alarm was activated. Learn how the network enables the continuous monitoring of employees' locations and selected measurements, short delays for data transfer, reliable operation and low interference. In addition, hear how the system is easy to install and can be extended by simply adding new devices to desired locations.
Takeaways:
• Future uses, including the ability to utilize temperature-sensing tags on patients, for continuous, remote monitoring of patients' whereabouts within the ward, as well as their body temperatures
• Other physiological parameters to measure, and how to measure them | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
Using RFID to Deliver Value to the Manufacturing Process
One of the world's largest diamond groups purchases rough diamonds and processes them into finished polished stones ready for sale. Its business process involves the shipping of high-value stones between locations and individuals. The company required a secure solution that could read thousands of stacked diamond parcels in very close proximity to one another, in any orientation, with 100 percent reliability, and that would be easy to use and globally deployable. Learn how the firm is employing an RFID system that securely tracks and traces stones as they move among various manufacturing departments, personnel and locations in real time.
Takeaways:
• How the company is utilizing RFID to optimize its manufacturing process
• How the system is providing accurate records of inventory values, resulting in a 100 percent reduction in the risk of being under-insured | | | 15:15—Track Sessions | | Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
RFID Helps Beverage Maker Track Shipping Containers
A Norwegian beverage company is employing EPC Gen 2 UHF RFID tags to track its reusable containers as they are shipped, filled with products, to retailers, and then returned empty to its distribution center. The company is tracking containers of beer and other beverages with RFID as they leave and return to its DC. Hear how the system is improving the management of containers within the DC's large shipping yard, as well as providing data regarding the movements of products in those containers, whether by truck or by rail.
Takeaways:
• How RFID can be used to minimize load and unload times
• The benefits of using a system that lets a producer know how many containers—and of what size—are available for loading, as well as the exact time they are loaded and then depart the yard | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
RFID and RTLS Bring Safety to Spanish Port
At one container terminal at a Spanish seaport on the Strait of Gibraltar, radio frequency identification and real-time location system (RTLS) technology are employed to track the locations of shuttles that drivers use to carry containers to and from vessels. The system ensures that the vehicles place the containers in the proper location, and that they are not at risk of colliding with other equipment. Both functions are critical, because some of the equipment that helps move the containers into and out of the terminal's transfer site is unmanned. In fact, the shuttle drivers are some of the few people on site. Hear how the terminal is successfully employing RFID and RTLS technologies to keep the expense of moving and storing containers to a minimum.
Takeaways:
• How the system combines productivity and reliability, resulting in manpower optimization
• Future uses, including a plan to expand the system to include trucks that transport the containers inland | | | 16:00—Track Sessions | | Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
Improving Worker Safety With RFID
In many industries, workers' safety is a company's first concern. Hear how a construction firm is using Wi-Fi-based tags to locate employees and communicate with them in real time as they bore through mountains in northwest Spain. Inside the tunnels are multiple hazards, including heavy equipment, dim lighting and periodic blasting to bore through rock. To track the hundreds of workers located within these tunnels, 24 hours a day, the firm uses the tags to enable it to know where each person is located, while also giving employees the ability to send a distress message in the event that they are in trouble. Learn how RFID enables managers to warn staff member of tunnel hazards within their vicinity, by sending a text message to each employee's badge.
Takeaways:
• The advantages of utilizing RFID-enabled badges for employees performing work under hazardous conditions
• How the system can preserve worker privacy, since the individual is tracked anonymously in the server until the company has a need to find a specific employee in emergency situations | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
Reducing Production Errors and Increasing Efficiencies With RFID
A German heating technology manufacturer is employing RFID technology to track work-in-progress as it produces residential boilers at one of its facilities. Battery-assisted passive tags are being used to identify where carts loaded with boilers should go next, and the system shuts itself down if a cart is wheeled to the wrong location. Since being installed at one of the factory's four assembly lines, the system has been responsible for reducing production errors six-fold, thereby increasing the quality and efficiency of the assembly process.
Takeaways:
• How the RFID-enabled automated system tracks when each task is completed, thereby allowing the next station to become operational only if all tasks have been completed at the prior station
• Identifying where any boiler (and corresponding operator) is located along the assembly process at any given time, providing the engineering team with greater details regarding where bottlenecks occur | | | 16:45—Track Sessions | | Enhancing Visibility and Traceability:
Reordering Supplies With RFID
A Finnish dental-supply company is using a system that simplifies the way it receives and tracks orders from its customers, and also helps it reduce errors and out-of-stocks. The firm delivers more than 30,000 consumable items, and typical customers place orders two to four times per month. Learn how the RFID-based ordering system is employed when a dental office places an order for a particular type of item, and how the technology triggers a new order, thus eliminating the need for the dental office to place an order by telephone or e-mail.
Takeaways:
• Saving time from routine work and deepening customer relationships with RFID
• Reducing the number of errors that might have otherwise resulted had an order been placed by phone or e-mail, or shipping delays that might have occurred if a dental office staff lacked the time to place such an order | | Improving Operational Efficiency:
Parts Manufacturer Uses RFID to Save Costs in Production Process
An internationally known automotive parts supplier is employing RFID-tagged kanban cards to trigger the replenishment of components for the diesel-fuel injectors that it manufactures at two separate locations in Germany. The cards contain passive high-frequency (HF) RFID tags at one site, and passive ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) RFID tags at another. At both plants, the company builds diesel-fuel injectors on several production lines, with machinery primarily controlled via computer. Workers oversee the machines and fill them with parts, such as screws and springs, as necessary. Hear how the use of RFID has resulted in significant time and cost savings, by speeding up the parts-replenishment process.
Takeaways:
• Improving a company's return on investment with RFID
• How an RFID system can reduce errors in the production process | | 17:30 | Conference Concludes
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All conference sessions are subject to change, and RFID Journal reserves the right to alter dates, programs and speakers at any time, as circumstances dictate. Sessions without assigned speakers indicate a target topic; every effort will be made to ensure that a program of equivalent standard and value is available.
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