Canadian Supply Chain Alliance Creates Affordable Compliance Solution for Wal-Mart, Target and DoD (Department of Defense) RFID Mandates
The 2nd annual RFID Journal Live-Canada conference held at the Toronto Congress Centre had a few exciting speakers and numerous case studies, but the announcement of the $5000 RFID Supply Chain Compliance Solution sent waves in the exhibition hall.
The solution created by an alliance among three Toronto-areas firms, including Banyan Commerce, GAO RFID, and Toshiba TEC Canada, demystifies and simplifies supply chain compliance such that small and medium enterprises can easily adopt the technology with minimal efforts and expense.
Vijay Thomas, a partner at Banyan Commerce says "The RFID marketplace was a nightmare for small and medium businesses with solutions costing anywhere from 10,000 to 1 million dollars with almost nobody willing to give a fixed cost estimate. I believe we have changed the RFID compliance market forever with our $5000 solution. At this price point we provide a 100% complete solution with an RFID printer, EDI Software with RFID integration, a desktop verification device and all the testing and implementation services included."
As part of the alliance GAO RFID provides their GenTop™ Standalone RFID Reader/Writer. It supports both EPC Class1 GEN 1 and GEN 2 Protocols operating in the UHF 860-960 MHz band, supporting both North America and the EU. GAO RFID also provides their rugged Toshiba TEC BSX4 RFID Printer. With a wide variety of connectivity options including wireless LAN 802.11b and internal Ethernet, the B-SX4 is the perfect combination of performance, quality, and value. Banyan Commerce provides the robust Banyan Commerce SAAS (software as a service) application framework which is currently used by hundreds of customers worldwide.
The Supply Chain Solution currently services companies ranging from small and medium businesses to Fortune 500 corporations. Retail suppliers are shielded from the complexity of dealing with their retail customers in terms of EDI, Data Synchronization and Bar-Coding. The Banyan RFID Express Software ensures retail suppliers, especially small and medium ones, meet compliance requirements-including RFID, and are taken care of from a single Web-based interface. The Banyan RFID Express solution provides 24/7 support and has a guaranteed uptime of 99.99%.
Edmund Rucels, the Vice President-Sales at GAORFID adds "This alliance is comprised of Canadian companies, but each company has a global footprint. I am excited that we will be taking this solution not only to the North American marketplace but to Europe and Asia as well."
A Wal-Mart supplier from Calgary, Alberta remarked "We have spent much more than $5,000 on conferences and training sessions and we have nothing in place to show for our RFID compliance deadline of January 2008. This Supply Chain RFID Solution is definitely something that all suppliers should have on their list of prospective solutions especially since implementation time is a guaranteed fifteen days."
