ISOIECJTC1 SC31WG4ARP The Draft Report on Next New Work Item

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ISO/IEC/JTC1 SC31/WG4/ARPThe Draft Report on
Next New Work Item

• 2003-02-10/03-19
• Orlando, Florida, USA
• Toshihiro Yoshioka

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What is the merit of RF tags system?
1.Intoroduction

• Recently the applications of RFID systems are
  increasing due to the low cost of RF chip and
  improving its performance.
• There are two main application fields of RFID
  technology
• 1.The contact-less IC card system. (ISO/IEC/JTC1
  /SC17/WG8)
• 2.RF tags system for item management (ISO/IEC/JTC
  1/SC31/WG4)
• In contact-less IC card application, cards are
  used widely as passes or reusable tickets for
  train, subways, buses etc. In this
  application it is easy to find the merits of
  usage of contact-less ICcard, compared with
  magnetic type card. The comparison of two
  systems is shown in Table 1.
• The rapid growth of RF tags application for item
  management has been expected, but the growth of
  the application market is slow and limited.
  There are many causes of these phenomena but one
  of the most important cause is that it is
  difficult to find the merits of RF tags system,
  compared with bar-code system.
• The comparison of two systems is shown in Table 2.

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2.The subjects for reliable access of RF tag

• To promote the usage of RF tags system the
  subjects of access reliability of tags and tags
  cost in disposal system should be solved.
  Because the wide operating range of RF tags is
  the key point of merits. In this report, the
  reliable access of tags are discussed mainly. The
  RF tags are used for the item management,
  attaching tags to the goods, baggage etc. The
  operating condition of RF tags are different
  depend on goods conditions size, materials and
  packaging etc. In case of contact-less IC card
  system, the cards are accessed by Reader/Writer
  antenna , passing through the card by manual. In
  this case, it is easy to determine the access
  condition compared with RF tags system for item
  management.
• The manufacturers of chips, RF tags and
  Reader/Writer have made effort to explain the
  features and performance of the products. Their
  explanation on the demerits and subjects in
  actual field operation was not enough.

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Table.1 The comparison of magnetic card and
contact-less IC card
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Table.2 The comparison of bar-code label and RF
tag
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• Therefore, there are many people who have the
  over expectation and believe the stories that the
  many goods attached RF tags in the baskets are
  accessed at once at the checkout counter of the
  supermarket. We heard these stories about 6
  years ago and many customers and engineers of POS
  terminal had challenged this subject. As the
  result of the challenge, these stories are valid
  theoretically in ideal conditions but it is
  difficult to realize this function in normal
  conditions of actual field application. There
  are many types of RF tags which have
  anti-collision protocol for example 10-100
  pieces of tags can be accessed in their technical
  report and catalogue.
• Fig.1 shows the multi-tags access systems. In
  this systems, tags in operating range of
  Reader/Writer antenna are accessed sequentially
  one by one, by anti-collision protocol.
• There are many customers who are trying to make
  sure this multi-tag access function in their
  applications in the world. After long time
  trials of this function, for example some group
  expended 2 years and the other group 1 year.
  Finally, many people understand that it is
  difficult to realize in normal condition, but it
  can be realized under the special condition.

Fig.1 The multi-tag access
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3.The operating characteristics of RF tags
3-1. Large size packages or goods

• Fig.2 shows the basic model of Reader/Writer
  antenna and their operating characteristics.
• There are there type of antenna single antenna ,
  2-antenna , tunnel type (3-antenna).
• The typical operating ranges of these three type
  of antenna and access model for single package
  are shown in Fig.2.
• Fig.3 shows the reading/writing characteristic of
  tunnel type of antenna for the multi-large size
  package on the pallets.

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Fig. 2 The reading/writing characteristics of RF
tags
Tag
OK
Reader/Writer
Tag
Reader/Writer
NG
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer2
Tag
OK
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer1
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer with tunnel type antenna
Tag
OK
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer
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Fig.3 The reading/writing characteristics of RF
tags tunnel type antenna
Reader/Writer
Tag
Tag
Tag
OK
OK
OK
OK
NG
OK
OK
NG
OK
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer with tunnel type antenna
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Fig.4 A model of reading/writing of multi-RF
tags in the package
3-2. Small size goods

• In the case of small goods in a package (box).
• Fig.4 shows a model of Read/Write function of
  multi-RF tags in the package (box). In the case,
  there are 9 goods with RF tags in the package.
  In general, RF tag can be accessed by the
  Reader/Writer antenna, without taking out each
  item from package. In actual introduction of
  this system , many conditions are required
• the total number of goods are known
• the goods dont include metallic materials etc
  are required for reliable operation.

• TagNo ?????
• 00001 OK
• 00002 OK
• 00003 OK
• 00004 OK
• 00005 NG
• 00006 NG
• 00007 OK
• 00008 OK
• 00009 OK
• --------------
• TOTAL 9?
• READ OK 7
• NG 2

RF antenna
Reader/Writer
PC
Tag
an example of reading result of multi-RF tag
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7
1
5
2
8
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer
9
3
6
A plane view of goods with RF tags
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• Step1.
• In Fig4. tag5 and tag6 can not be read.
  The reasons of the reading error are supposed
• ?tags orientation
• ?tags overlap
• ?metallic materials
• ?tag is destroyed etc
• Step2.
• To find the tags which are not read, that
  is to find the tag5 and tag6, the following
  conditions
• are required.
• ?the total number of goods (tags) are known
• ?the number of tags which can be read and
  cannot be read are known
• respectively.
• ?the unique ID number of NG tags are known.
• In this model, if the operator find the NG
  tags in PC screen, the operator should pick up
  the
• goods corresponding number of NG tag in
  the box.
• In this case the goods attached No5 and
  No6 tags are picked up and checked again.

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Fig.5 A model of traceability system by RF tags
in SCM
Consumer
Host Computer
Sorting Process
Shipping
Production Line
Consumer
Tunnel type Antenna
RF tag
Reader/Writer
Factory
Transportation
Consumer
Retail
Shop Ware house
Shop
Distribution Center
Production line
Ware house in Factory
Consumer
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4. The necessity of Printed labels or barcode
labels in RF tags system.
Fig5. shows a model of traceability system by RF
tags in SCM. The goods (products) are produced
in the factory and will be carried to
distribution center ? shop warehouse ? retail
shop ? consumer. To realize reliable item
management system, it is desired that the goods
are identified in each stage. The product labels
are attached to the goods and the label includes
the typical information as follows product
name product code product lot number name
of manufacturers produced day, month,
year etc In bar-code system, bar-code printed
labels are attached to the goods. The operator
scans the bar-code labels to identify goods in
each stage in SCM.
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• The bar-code system is more effective to input
  the product information to the computer (PC , POS
  terminal etc) compared with manual input by
  operator.
• In bar-code system, if the bar-code can not be
  read due to the bad environment, dust, oil,
  split etc, the operator read the printed
  information on the label and input the data by
  keyboard, that is the recovery system. The
  reading success rate of bar-code label is
  different in each application system.
• If even the reading success rate are 9598, the
  bar-code system can achieve the 100 reliability
  by operators recovery method.
• In case of RF tags system in SCM, it is supposed
  that the same situations will occur in bar-code
  system. So we have to prepare the recovery
  system (method) for the accident. Fig.6 shows
  the recovery systems in both cases bar-code
  system and RF tags system.

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Fig.6 The recovery system for bar-code scanning
system and RF tags access system
RF Tag Scanning System The information of
RF tag are input to the POS terminal by scanning
RF tag Reader/Writer.
Bar-Code Scanning System The information of
bar-code label are input to the POS terminal by
bar-code reader.
Reader/Writer
In case of reading error
In case of reading error
The operator read the printed data on the labels
and input the data to POS terminal in manual.
Recovery System
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Fig.7 The necessity of printed label, bar-code
label and RF tags

• CONCLUSIONS
• 1.Need the visible printed information
• As the result of previous description, in RF tags
  system , if the information can not be read by
  the wire-less method, operator can not read out
  any information from RF tags . Therefore, the RF
  tags systems fundamentally needs the visible
  printed labels. In source making system, the
  printing of bar-code dont need additional cost.
• 2.Draft next new work item TRACEABILITY
• In SC31/WG4/ARP, we have not discussed enough
  about fundamental relationship between bar-code
  system and RF tag system. It hasnt merits that
  only replacing the bar-code label to RF tags.
  But bar-code system have limited information for
  product traceability. In the future, the
  traceability of products by AIDC technology in
  the field of quality control, recycle of products
  in environment will become important work item.

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Can you drink a bottle of juice without printed
label ?
Bottle Juice with RF tag
Bottle Juice with Printed Label
Bottle Juice with Printed Label and Bar-Code
Without Printed Label
Printed Label
RF tag
Bar-Code
Can you drink this juice?
Fig.8 The necessity of printed label in RF tags
system
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Annex-1

• The compatibility with bar-code system and RFID
  system
• 1.Operational condition
• Bar-code one by one
• aiming the bar-code label
• face to face , label and scanner
• RF-tag one by one basically
• multi product access is allowed in special
  condition
• aiming the RF-tag in case of single RF
  antenna
• passing through the products in case of
  tunnel type
• RF antenna

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Fig. 10
Reader/Writer with tunnel type antenna
Fig. 9
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer with tunnel type antenna
Tag
NG
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer
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Fig. 11
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer with tunnel type antenna
Tag
OK
Reader/Writer
Reader/Writer