1 00:00:01,098 --> 00:00:02,640 ROBERT CLARKE: My name is Rob Clarke. 2 00:00:02,640 --> 00:00:05,820 I'm from Michigan State University School of Packaging. 3 00:00:05,820 --> 00:00:11,370 And I've been doing RFID research since 1999. 4 00:00:11,370 --> 00:00:15,690 We just are in the process of finalizing purchase of a 10,000 5 00:00:15,690 --> 00:00:20,250 square foot facility to move a new lab that'll look 6 00:00:20,250 --> 00:00:22,710 at both active and passive. 7 00:00:22,710 --> 00:00:27,390 But moving forward with this whole session now-- 8 00:00:27,390 --> 00:00:31,590 a couple of things that kind of bothered me about this. 9 00:00:31,590 --> 00:00:34,470 I keep walking in and on the bulletin boards 10 00:00:34,470 --> 00:00:37,680 right outside the door there is a big advertisement 11 00:00:37,680 --> 00:00:41,400 for Urinetown, and I want to know who leaked information 12 00:00:41,400 --> 00:00:42,300 about this session. 13 00:00:45,300 --> 00:00:47,187 OK. 14 00:00:47,187 --> 00:00:49,020 From a packaging standpoint, how many people 15 00:00:49,020 --> 00:00:52,560 here are directly involved with packaging? 16 00:00:52,560 --> 00:00:53,060 OK. 17 00:00:53,060 --> 00:00:54,260 A few. 18 00:00:54,260 --> 00:00:57,110 You may or may not know Jim Goff-- the name-- 19 00:00:57,110 --> 00:00:59,930 who founded the packaging discipline 20 00:00:59,930 --> 00:01:03,560 at Michigan State University-- the first academic packaging 21 00:01:03,560 --> 00:01:05,209 facility in the world. 22 00:01:05,209 --> 00:01:06,650 He just passed away last week. 23 00:01:06,650 --> 00:01:11,160 And it's a very unfortunate situation. 24 00:01:11,160 --> 00:01:14,240 And for those of you that didn't know, on the news this morning, 25 00:01:14,240 --> 00:01:16,432 Super Value just purchased Albertsons. 26 00:01:16,432 --> 00:01:18,140 And we don't know what that's going to do 27 00:01:18,140 --> 00:01:22,070 to their RFID announcements. 28 00:01:22,070 --> 00:01:23,990 But I also want to thank the sound guy 29 00:01:23,990 --> 00:01:26,390 up there because he's been working his tail off 30 00:01:26,390 --> 00:01:29,240 for this entire conference. 31 00:01:29,240 --> 00:01:30,620 And the rest you'll wait for. 32 00:01:33,420 --> 00:01:37,800 Special thanks to Steve Miles and the MIT crew, 33 00:01:37,800 --> 00:01:39,540 the conference committee for all the work 34 00:01:39,540 --> 00:01:42,120 and phone calls that we had back and forth, 35 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:45,370 all the speakers, and of course, all the attendees 36 00:01:45,370 --> 00:01:49,470 because without the interchange of our ideas and your input 37 00:01:49,470 --> 00:01:51,480 this wouldn't move very far. 38 00:01:51,480 --> 00:01:54,030 And we can all say that we're part of the soakers club 39 00:01:54,030 --> 00:01:58,380 now due to our walk yesterday crossing the puddles on the way 40 00:01:58,380 --> 00:01:59,180 there. 41 00:01:59,180 --> 00:02:02,130 We're bound for life. 42 00:02:02,130 --> 00:02:03,630 Why study packaging? 43 00:02:03,630 --> 00:02:08,100 What does packaging have to do with "riff-id" or "arr-fid" 44 00:02:08,100 --> 00:02:09,479 or anything else. 45 00:02:09,479 --> 00:02:13,800 Well, Throckmorton P. Ruddygore III, one of my favorite people 46 00:02:13,800 --> 00:02:17,850 once stated, packaging is a center of the universe. 47 00:02:17,850 --> 00:02:19,830 You might as well accept it now. 48 00:02:19,830 --> 00:02:24,420 All these other disciplines and fields just support packaging. 49 00:02:24,420 --> 00:02:26,100 And once you come to that agreement, 50 00:02:26,100 --> 00:02:30,810 you'll see why packaging is relevant to RFID. 51 00:02:30,810 --> 00:02:36,570 Our work is a ground-level, hands-on approach. 52 00:02:36,570 --> 00:02:39,450 A lot of the information that I hear 53 00:02:39,450 --> 00:02:42,840 is the 30,000 foot overview, which is wonderful. 54 00:02:42,840 --> 00:02:43,770 It sets direction. 55 00:02:43,770 --> 00:02:45,030 It sets precedence. 56 00:02:45,030 --> 00:02:48,310 And it doesn't mean shit if it doesn't work. 57 00:02:48,310 --> 00:02:51,720 You have to have the ground-level, hands-on approach 58 00:02:51,720 --> 00:02:53,100 to make sure it works. 59 00:02:53,100 --> 00:02:55,980 That's what packaging does. 60 00:02:55,980 --> 00:02:59,820 Now, why is this so? 61 00:02:59,820 --> 00:03:01,170 What is packaging? 62 00:03:01,170 --> 00:03:02,040 Real quickly. 63 00:03:02,040 --> 00:03:05,370 You're all going to be experts in 30 seconds or so. 64 00:03:05,370 --> 00:03:07,380 There are different levels of packaging. 65 00:03:07,380 --> 00:03:09,780 Primary, secondary, tertiary, all the way up 66 00:03:09,780 --> 00:03:13,030 through unitized loads or cargo container loads, 67 00:03:13,030 --> 00:03:14,400 however you want to look at it. 68 00:03:14,400 --> 00:03:17,430 Primary physically holds the product. 69 00:03:17,430 --> 00:03:20,640 A bottle is a primary container. 70 00:03:20,640 --> 00:03:23,970 Secondary container-- we're really brilliant-- 71 00:03:23,970 --> 00:03:25,890 holds primary containers. 72 00:03:25,890 --> 00:03:29,910 So a six pack of your favorite amber beverages 73 00:03:29,910 --> 00:03:32,010 would be a secondary container. 74 00:03:32,010 --> 00:03:34,590 Tertiary-- I bet you're getting this now-- 75 00:03:34,590 --> 00:03:36,090 holds the secondary. 76 00:03:36,090 --> 00:03:41,730 So a shipping case would be the tertiary, and on and on and on. 77 00:03:41,730 --> 00:03:47,220 Not all products have the same levels or requirements. 78 00:03:47,220 --> 00:03:49,350 You also have different requirements 79 00:03:49,350 --> 00:03:51,420 for different industries. 80 00:03:51,420 --> 00:03:53,128 You have the consumer sector, which 81 00:03:53,128 --> 00:03:54,420 we've heard a great deal about. 82 00:03:54,420 --> 00:03:57,210 Retail outlets, these types of things. 83 00:03:57,210 --> 00:04:00,480 Industrial sector really hasn't gotten a lot of play 84 00:04:00,480 --> 00:04:04,620 here except some of the DHL and larger volumes, 85 00:04:04,620 --> 00:04:06,300 but it's a huge market. 86 00:04:06,300 --> 00:04:08,790 When you think of all the trucks you see driving down 87 00:04:08,790 --> 00:04:13,800 the highways with the big boxes of materials or machinery, 88 00:04:13,800 --> 00:04:16,920 that's a sector that is completely ignored. 89 00:04:16,920 --> 00:04:20,790 Military-- think about packaging something 90 00:04:20,790 --> 00:04:23,260 that you don't know when it's going to be used, 91 00:04:23,260 --> 00:04:27,540 where it's going to be used, or what the evaluation is for once 92 00:04:27,540 --> 00:04:31,590 it is in use somewhere between now and 20 years from now. 93 00:04:31,590 --> 00:04:33,420 How do you package that? 94 00:04:33,420 --> 00:04:35,335 Real interesting dichotomy. 95 00:04:35,335 --> 00:04:37,710 And then, of course, medical pharmaceuticals, which we've 96 00:04:37,710 --> 00:04:39,270 heard a great deal about. 97 00:04:39,270 --> 00:04:40,830 How many of you want your packaging 98 00:04:40,830 --> 00:04:45,690 to fail prior to taking your medicine? 99 00:04:45,690 --> 00:04:47,370 Huge implications. 100 00:04:47,370 --> 00:04:55,140 And what goes on for powdered soap for Mr. Procter & Gamble, 101 00:04:55,140 --> 00:04:55,770 Cascade-- 102 00:04:55,770 --> 00:04:58,350 you brought that up earlier-- 103 00:04:58,350 --> 00:05:00,450 is a little different than what goes on 104 00:05:00,450 --> 00:05:03,990 for a life-saving medicine, and there 105 00:05:03,990 --> 00:05:05,410 are different requirements. 106 00:05:05,410 --> 00:05:08,040 So packaging has to address those. 107 00:05:08,040 --> 00:05:12,510 It then has to do all of that with an eye towards cost. 108 00:05:12,510 --> 00:05:19,380 And for 10 seconds, cost and price are not equal, period. 109 00:05:19,380 --> 00:05:23,130 You don't talk about the aversion to moving 110 00:05:23,130 --> 00:05:25,380 into RFID because of the cost. 111 00:05:25,380 --> 00:05:27,510 It's actually the price that most people-- 112 00:05:27,510 --> 00:05:30,900 if they look at the cost, you have insurance costs, 113 00:05:30,900 --> 00:05:35,700 liability costs, opportunity costs, goodwill costs. 114 00:05:35,700 --> 00:05:39,180 And you have to balance the costs, positive and negative, 115 00:05:39,180 --> 00:05:41,040 before you can make a business case. 116 00:05:41,040 --> 00:05:43,290 And that's more of the business side coming out. 117 00:05:43,290 --> 00:05:46,020 Price is what you pay for something. 118 00:05:46,020 --> 00:05:48,960 Environmental issues. 119 00:05:48,960 --> 00:05:56,160 Simply put, your product plus your package, at worst, 120 00:05:56,160 --> 00:05:59,010 has to equal the environment that you're 121 00:05:59,010 --> 00:06:02,042 going to ship it through. 122 00:06:02,042 --> 00:06:03,750 Now, you know everything you need to know 123 00:06:03,750 --> 00:06:05,520 about packaging, pretty much. 124 00:06:05,520 --> 00:06:09,420 If a package doesn't do its job in that environment, 125 00:06:09,420 --> 00:06:11,970 it breaks down, product spills or breaks. 126 00:06:11,970 --> 00:06:12,905 No good. 127 00:06:12,905 --> 00:06:16,200 If it's too good and your product all 128 00:06:16,200 --> 00:06:20,320 gets there in perfect shape, you're losing money. 129 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:22,080 So there's a fine balance and trade 130 00:06:22,080 --> 00:06:24,720 off there that you have to look at. 131 00:06:24,720 --> 00:06:28,290 Four main functions of packaging, any one of which 132 00:06:28,290 --> 00:06:30,570 can be considered a package by itself, 133 00:06:30,570 --> 00:06:33,120 but ideally, most of the packages we're talking about 134 00:06:33,120 --> 00:06:34,530 have all four. 135 00:06:34,530 --> 00:06:35,700 Containment. 136 00:06:35,700 --> 00:06:37,140 Physical holding. 137 00:06:37,140 --> 00:06:39,250 You'll see my little no sign up there. 138 00:06:39,250 --> 00:06:39,930 Why? 139 00:06:39,930 --> 00:06:43,140 Because the containment function of packaging 140 00:06:43,140 --> 00:06:45,450 really doesn't mean anything with respect 141 00:06:45,450 --> 00:06:48,510 to RFID implementation. 142 00:06:48,510 --> 00:06:50,490 Convenience and utility. 143 00:06:50,490 --> 00:06:52,620 Easy opening features. 144 00:06:52,620 --> 00:06:54,060 Reclosability. 145 00:06:54,060 --> 00:06:55,710 Secondary uses. 146 00:06:55,710 --> 00:06:57,930 These types of things in packages. 147 00:06:57,930 --> 00:07:04,050 Maybe, maybe not have an opportunity with RF. 148 00:07:04,050 --> 00:07:07,770 If you're looking at material sorting in a recycling center, 149 00:07:07,770 --> 00:07:08,550 maybe. 150 00:07:08,550 --> 00:07:10,290 That's a possibility. 151 00:07:10,290 --> 00:07:13,110 Now, communication and protection. 152 00:07:13,110 --> 00:07:15,510 A package should communicate to the users 153 00:07:15,510 --> 00:07:18,510 how to open it, how to close it, safety. 154 00:07:18,510 --> 00:07:21,330 Don't try ripping the damn plastic clam shells apart 155 00:07:21,330 --> 00:07:23,550 with your hands because you'll cut your fingers up. 156 00:07:23,550 --> 00:07:26,258 That's the number 1 hated package in the world. 157 00:07:26,258 --> 00:07:28,050 It doesn't matter what country you're from. 158 00:07:28,050 --> 00:07:29,520 People hate it. 159 00:07:29,520 --> 00:07:34,050 But protection is a really key one for almost every package 160 00:07:34,050 --> 00:07:34,980 system. 161 00:07:34,980 --> 00:07:38,710 You have to protect the contents from the environment, 162 00:07:38,710 --> 00:07:41,790 be it a physical environment, shock, vibration, 163 00:07:41,790 --> 00:07:44,940 compression, during distribution and handling. 164 00:07:44,940 --> 00:07:49,950 Be it environmental and temperature, humidity. 165 00:07:49,950 --> 00:07:51,450 Salt spray. 166 00:07:51,450 --> 00:07:52,860 We had conference, too. 167 00:07:52,860 --> 00:07:54,480 These types of things. 168 00:07:54,480 --> 00:07:58,080 You also in many cases need a package 169 00:07:58,080 --> 00:08:02,250 to protect the environment from the product. 170 00:08:02,250 --> 00:08:03,930 Nuclear waste. 171 00:08:03,930 --> 00:08:05,880 How many of you want those packages 172 00:08:05,880 --> 00:08:09,630 to fall apart and leak, say, any time within the next 20,000 173 00:08:09,630 --> 00:08:11,260 years? 174 00:08:11,260 --> 00:08:13,290 So these are functions of packaging that you 175 00:08:13,290 --> 00:08:15,000 need to take into account. 176 00:08:15,000 --> 00:08:16,680 The impact of this? 177 00:08:16,680 --> 00:08:17,370 It's cool. 178 00:08:17,370 --> 00:08:19,620 Everything has to be packaged. 179 00:08:19,620 --> 00:08:21,400 It's the center of the universe. 180 00:08:21,400 --> 00:08:26,260 You can go into any field you want through packaging, 181 00:08:26,260 --> 00:08:28,300 and students like that. 182 00:08:28,300 --> 00:08:34,210 All companies and industry use it at some level. 183 00:08:34,210 --> 00:08:38,500 And it should withstand the rigors of distribution, manual 184 00:08:38,500 --> 00:08:41,440 and mechanical handlings, warehousing and storage, 185 00:08:41,440 --> 00:08:45,340 not create any problems, and give the ultimate user 186 00:08:45,340 --> 00:08:46,930 a sense of value. 187 00:08:46,930 --> 00:08:48,700 What is value in this case? 188 00:08:48,700 --> 00:08:51,950 You ask somebody, what is it that you want? 189 00:08:51,950 --> 00:08:54,140 And then you give it to them. 190 00:08:54,140 --> 00:08:57,460 And if you really want customer satisfaction, 191 00:08:57,460 --> 00:08:59,500 give them something extra. 192 00:08:59,500 --> 00:09:00,460 What a bargain. 193 00:09:00,460 --> 00:09:02,290 What a value. 194 00:09:02,290 --> 00:09:05,260 Package and can do this. 195 00:09:05,260 --> 00:09:08,530 Now, at the MSU School of Packaging, 196 00:09:08,530 --> 00:09:12,880 we focus on RFID applications for the supply chain 197 00:09:12,880 --> 00:09:16,750 because the item level is a great marketing thing, 198 00:09:16,750 --> 00:09:19,780 but it's a ways off. 199 00:09:19,780 --> 00:09:22,300 Supply chain has some real applications. 200 00:09:22,300 --> 00:09:25,090 You're using bulk quantities. 201 00:09:25,090 --> 00:09:26,770 You have fixed points that you're 202 00:09:26,770 --> 00:09:28,600 using, although they're nebulous depending 203 00:09:28,600 --> 00:09:30,490 on the company and everything else. 204 00:09:30,490 --> 00:09:35,050 And you want to ultimately define the perfect purchase 205 00:09:35,050 --> 00:09:39,460 order so when a store or customer orders a product 206 00:09:39,460 --> 00:09:44,050 or a truckload of products, they get exactly what they want, 207 00:09:44,050 --> 00:09:46,510 when they want it, in the right count. 208 00:09:46,510 --> 00:09:51,760 And that's one of the things RFID can do. 209 00:09:51,760 --> 00:09:55,450 Little aside-- MSU School of Packaging, 210 00:09:55,450 --> 00:09:57,760 we have 600 undergraduates. 211 00:09:57,760 --> 00:10:03,400 We have just about 100 master students and 20 PhDs. 212 00:10:03,400 --> 00:10:05,080 Who'd have thunk packaging would be 213 00:10:05,080 --> 00:10:08,990 that big all in our own school? 214 00:10:08,990 --> 00:10:11,590 Now, we haven't spent a lot of time talking 215 00:10:11,590 --> 00:10:14,810 about active packaging a little bit yesterday, 216 00:10:14,810 --> 00:10:19,900 but there is a real opportunity for complementary 217 00:10:19,900 --> 00:10:22,300 active and passive application. 218 00:10:22,300 --> 00:10:25,870 If you start down here with item levels, going into a case, 219 00:10:25,870 --> 00:10:29,470 going into a pallet, ultimately going into a container, 220 00:10:29,470 --> 00:10:31,070 you can track those. 221 00:10:31,070 --> 00:10:34,360 And if you note, some of those require passive tags, 222 00:10:34,360 --> 00:10:38,230 meaning the tags don't have any internal energy source. 223 00:10:38,230 --> 00:10:40,660 They collect it from the readers at read points. 224 00:10:40,660 --> 00:10:43,810 Versus an active tag, which may go on the container. 225 00:10:43,810 --> 00:10:45,820 And you'll see if you look in the bottom corner, 226 00:10:45,820 --> 00:10:48,700 I stole this from the Department of Defense 227 00:10:48,700 --> 00:10:50,500 because this is how they ship things over 228 00:10:50,500 --> 00:10:56,140 to the Middle East for the Iraqi and Afghanistan 229 00:10:56,140 --> 00:10:58,990 or wherever the hell they are over there. 230 00:10:58,990 --> 00:11:02,020 Pakistan having problems. 231 00:11:02,020 --> 00:11:04,480 And I like it because it shows that you 232 00:11:04,480 --> 00:11:07,690 have different responsibilities at different parts 233 00:11:07,690 --> 00:11:08,830 of the supply chain. 234 00:11:08,830 --> 00:11:10,450 And there's a lot more to this, but I 235 00:11:10,450 --> 00:11:13,960 want you to realize that because here's the key. 236 00:11:13,960 --> 00:11:17,500 There's nothing that says some of those applications 237 00:11:17,500 --> 00:11:20,050 have to be RFID. 238 00:11:20,050 --> 00:11:21,460 I love RFID. 239 00:11:21,460 --> 00:11:23,560 I live and breathe RFID. 240 00:11:23,560 --> 00:11:26,330 But it's just a technology. 241 00:11:26,330 --> 00:11:30,380 And there are a lot of different frequencies and applications, 242 00:11:30,380 --> 00:11:34,060 some of which are better suited by other technologies. 243 00:11:34,060 --> 00:11:37,360 There are different frequencies than 9:15. 244 00:11:37,360 --> 00:11:42,070 I think the opportunities presented by EPC 245 00:11:42,070 --> 00:11:45,580 for bringing a lot of positive things to the world 246 00:11:45,580 --> 00:11:52,690 is a strong, well-defined, forward-thinking process. 247 00:11:52,690 --> 00:11:56,680 But it's not the only RFID process out there. 248 00:11:56,680 --> 00:11:58,990 They cover 13.56, 9.15. 249 00:11:58,990 --> 00:12:01,120 Those are key elements. 250 00:12:01,120 --> 00:12:03,190 But there's a lot of other applications 251 00:12:03,190 --> 00:12:05,140 that don't use those frequencies, that 252 00:12:05,140 --> 00:12:07,600 don't use the same type of applications, 253 00:12:07,600 --> 00:12:12,490 and we will have to be careful not to exclude those and focus 254 00:12:12,490 --> 00:12:15,160 only on certain areas. 255 00:12:15,160 --> 00:12:17,800 Now, why look to a university? 256 00:12:17,800 --> 00:12:21,430 Well, I made this one up because it looks cool. 257 00:12:21,430 --> 00:12:24,550 And of course, packaging's in the center of that universe, 258 00:12:24,550 --> 00:12:26,860 as we all know it should be by now. 259 00:12:26,860 --> 00:12:29,590 But we interact with users, we interact 260 00:12:29,590 --> 00:12:33,770 with institutional players, and we interact with suppliers. 261 00:12:33,770 --> 00:12:38,210 We have nothing to sell except our work and our research. 262 00:12:38,210 --> 00:12:41,810 And if we don't do a good job, we don't sell it very well. 263 00:12:41,810 --> 00:12:44,350 So these are some of the areas that I would encourage 264 00:12:44,350 --> 00:12:48,010 you to look at, think about, and if it makes sense for you 265 00:12:48,010 --> 00:12:52,150 to develop some of the work with the university, hey. 266 00:12:52,150 --> 00:12:54,190 We encourage it. 267 00:12:54,190 --> 00:12:55,612 Packaging materials. 268 00:12:55,612 --> 00:12:57,070 This is where I was afraid you were 269 00:12:57,070 --> 00:13:00,520 going to fall asleep so I put in a moving picture for you. 270 00:13:00,520 --> 00:13:04,930 What are the materials, major materials of packaging? 271 00:13:04,930 --> 00:13:09,160 Well, in somewhat of an order here, wood. 272 00:13:09,160 --> 00:13:11,050 Huge area. 273 00:13:11,050 --> 00:13:12,580 Very few people talk about it. 274 00:13:12,580 --> 00:13:13,780 They think wood pallets. 275 00:13:13,780 --> 00:13:14,870 That's it. 276 00:13:14,870 --> 00:13:18,850 But there are so many wooden packages out there 277 00:13:18,850 --> 00:13:21,470 that you lose sight of them because they're 278 00:13:21,470 --> 00:13:23,410 a tree in the forest. 279 00:13:23,410 --> 00:13:27,950 Paper, which is slightly different than that. 280 00:13:27,950 --> 00:13:31,660 And there are a lot of different types of paper. 281 00:13:31,660 --> 00:13:33,920 There is not one type of paper, so you 282 00:13:33,920 --> 00:13:35,293 say it reads through paper. 283 00:13:35,293 --> 00:13:37,460 If you say that, you don't know what the hell you're 284 00:13:37,460 --> 00:13:40,490 talking about because papers are treated, 285 00:13:40,490 --> 00:13:45,260 coated, laminated, different processing issues that go on. 286 00:13:45,260 --> 00:13:48,350 And all of those can affect their characteristics 287 00:13:48,350 --> 00:13:50,690 and either lend themselves to benefit 288 00:13:50,690 --> 00:13:55,160 RFID or, on the other side, block it. 289 00:13:55,160 --> 00:13:57,170 Then we have problems. 290 00:13:57,170 --> 00:13:58,010 Plastics. 291 00:13:58,010 --> 00:14:01,250 And these are things that I'll spend a little more time with. 292 00:14:01,250 --> 00:14:04,220 Name me the plastic. 293 00:14:04,220 --> 00:14:04,820 You can't. 294 00:14:04,820 --> 00:14:06,210 There's, like, a billion of them. 295 00:14:06,210 --> 00:14:07,670 That's the beauty of plastics. 296 00:14:07,670 --> 00:14:10,825 You can build in the requirements that you want. 297 00:14:10,825 --> 00:14:12,950 You add a little bit of this, a little bit of that, 298 00:14:12,950 --> 00:14:16,850 and you have a gas barrier, a light barrier, a moisture 299 00:14:16,850 --> 00:14:18,440 barrier, all these things. 300 00:14:18,440 --> 00:14:20,360 And you can mix and match so you can 301 00:14:20,360 --> 00:14:23,540 design any plastic you want. 302 00:14:23,540 --> 00:14:25,100 Metals. 303 00:14:25,100 --> 00:14:26,330 Huge opportunity. 304 00:14:26,330 --> 00:14:29,510 A lot of metal packaging still available. 305 00:14:29,510 --> 00:14:31,907 And glass, of course. 306 00:14:31,907 --> 00:14:34,490 Now, the interesting thing about glass-- well, I'll skip that. 307 00:14:34,490 --> 00:14:38,210 Now, from a packaging standpoint, 308 00:14:38,210 --> 00:14:40,565 there is no cardboard. 309 00:14:40,565 --> 00:14:42,440 And I've heard several people make reference, 310 00:14:42,440 --> 00:14:46,520 and it's OK because you hadn't had this class before. 311 00:14:46,520 --> 00:14:49,880 But cardboard is not a technical term. 312 00:14:49,880 --> 00:14:52,760 And if you'll notice, in some of the presentations, 313 00:14:52,760 --> 00:14:57,230 cardboard in one presentation referred to rolled paper. 314 00:14:57,230 --> 00:15:00,050 Cardboard in another referred to corrugated. 315 00:15:00,050 --> 00:15:03,200 And then another referred to paperboard, 316 00:15:03,200 --> 00:15:07,880 which is like what's on the back of your writing tablets. 317 00:15:07,880 --> 00:15:11,510 And so from that standpoint, they're different terms. 318 00:15:11,510 --> 00:15:16,430 Solid, fibreboard would be your cardboard 319 00:15:16,430 --> 00:15:18,830 if you'll use that on the back of your writing. 320 00:15:18,830 --> 00:15:20,330 Corrugated board. 321 00:15:20,330 --> 00:15:22,700 Your cardboard box. 322 00:15:22,700 --> 00:15:26,328 And I'm going to put this up not because you're idiots, 323 00:15:26,328 --> 00:15:27,620 but I just like to draw on the. 324 00:15:27,620 --> 00:15:31,840 Board OK? 325 00:15:31,840 --> 00:15:34,410 That's a cross section of a corrugated box. 326 00:15:34,410 --> 00:15:36,160 And I have it there for a reason that I'll 327 00:15:36,160 --> 00:15:38,200 get to in a little bit. 328 00:15:38,200 --> 00:15:43,420 Now, the impact of these materials on RFID. 329 00:15:43,420 --> 00:15:46,450 Different frequencies exhibit different behaviors 330 00:15:46,450 --> 00:15:51,008 around different materials and applications, period. 331 00:15:51,008 --> 00:15:52,300 That's the nature of the world. 332 00:15:52,300 --> 00:15:53,930 Can't change it. 333 00:15:53,930 --> 00:15:56,800 You need to find the one that works. 334 00:15:56,800 --> 00:16:02,440 Metal has a large effect on most RF systems, 335 00:16:02,440 --> 00:16:06,100 and particularly true at the UHF. 336 00:16:06,100 --> 00:16:07,330 It blocks it. 337 00:16:07,330 --> 00:16:09,850 It re-radiates it. 338 00:16:09,850 --> 00:16:12,410 It sends it off elsewhere. 339 00:16:12,410 --> 00:16:15,280 Now, interestingly, if you know that, 340 00:16:15,280 --> 00:16:17,530 you can use that to your benefit. 341 00:16:17,530 --> 00:16:20,490 And in our facility, we've been able to double our read 342 00:16:20,490 --> 00:16:23,710 range by directing things at an angle 343 00:16:23,710 --> 00:16:26,680 off of large metal structures. 344 00:16:26,680 --> 00:16:29,840 And it works wonderfully if you can control the environment. 345 00:16:29,840 --> 00:16:32,780 Now, in the supply chain, good luck. 346 00:16:32,780 --> 00:16:35,800 But in certain situations, you can do that. 347 00:16:35,800 --> 00:16:36,670 Plastics. 348 00:16:36,670 --> 00:16:39,850 Now, plastics, because there are so many different ones, 349 00:16:39,850 --> 00:16:42,160 they vary all over the map. 350 00:16:42,160 --> 00:16:44,320 Some plastics are RF friendly. 351 00:16:44,320 --> 00:16:46,090 Some hate it. 352 00:16:46,090 --> 00:16:49,360 Common ones, your PETs, your Polyethylene Terephthalates, 353 00:16:49,360 --> 00:16:52,870 your Coke bottles, your polyethylene, 354 00:16:52,870 --> 00:16:57,100 or polypropylene, all of those are pretty RF friendly 355 00:16:57,100 --> 00:16:58,810 and can be utilized. 356 00:16:58,810 --> 00:17:02,200 But not all plastics react the same. 357 00:17:02,200 --> 00:17:07,480 Now, interestingly, glass can be claimed to have little 358 00:17:07,480 --> 00:17:09,520 to no effect on RF. 359 00:17:09,520 --> 00:17:13,150 That can be true, but you keep in mind 360 00:17:13,150 --> 00:17:15,460 that glass is not glass. 361 00:17:15,460 --> 00:17:17,020 Whoa. 362 00:17:17,020 --> 00:17:17,589 All right. 363 00:17:17,589 --> 00:17:19,960 This is metaphysical already. 364 00:17:19,960 --> 00:17:22,240 Glass is like plastics. 365 00:17:22,240 --> 00:17:23,740 It's like paper. 366 00:17:23,740 --> 00:17:26,750 You order the type of glass you want to use. 367 00:17:26,750 --> 00:17:28,600 There are different classes of glass. 368 00:17:28,600 --> 00:17:30,700 Those of you in the pharmaceutical industry 369 00:17:30,700 --> 00:17:31,450 know that. 370 00:17:31,450 --> 00:17:34,870 You can have class 1, class 2, class 3, class 4. 371 00:17:34,870 --> 00:17:38,590 And in changing that, when you're making your glass, 372 00:17:38,590 --> 00:17:40,810 you add a little bit of this, a little bit of that, 373 00:17:40,810 --> 00:17:42,400 to get different properties. 374 00:17:42,400 --> 00:17:45,580 Think about in your kitchen, those of you that have Pyrex. 375 00:17:45,580 --> 00:17:46,450 Cookware. 376 00:17:46,450 --> 00:17:49,540 If you drop it, it bounces. 377 00:17:49,540 --> 00:17:52,360 That's not the same as your light bulb. 378 00:17:52,360 --> 00:17:54,100 Glass is not always glass. 379 00:17:54,100 --> 00:17:58,287 And the composition of glass can impact the properties. 380 00:17:58,287 --> 00:18:00,370 Now, I didn't have time to put in a slide of this, 381 00:18:00,370 --> 00:18:01,990 but here's some testing we did. 382 00:18:01,990 --> 00:18:05,990 We took panes of glass, and it was class 2. 383 00:18:05,990 --> 00:18:09,430 If anybody cares, like your window pane. 384 00:18:09,430 --> 00:18:13,870 Clear, amber, and green. 385 00:18:13,870 --> 00:18:18,710 We took an RF tag read, got a read range, 386 00:18:18,710 --> 00:18:22,150 and then we put the tag behind glass. 387 00:18:22,150 --> 00:18:24,010 Our read range dropped. 388 00:18:24,010 --> 00:18:26,800 We sandwiched the tag between glass. 389 00:18:26,800 --> 00:18:30,080 Our read range dropped. 390 00:18:30,080 --> 00:18:31,320 Huh? 391 00:18:31,320 --> 00:18:32,820 Shouldn't happen that way. 392 00:18:32,820 --> 00:18:35,070 But it depends on what's added. 393 00:18:35,070 --> 00:18:36,960 You need to think about that. 394 00:18:36,960 --> 00:18:38,920 Paper, little to no effect. 395 00:18:38,920 --> 00:18:40,800 And for the reasons I stated earlier, 396 00:18:40,800 --> 00:18:42,930 that's not always the case. 397 00:18:42,930 --> 00:18:45,150 Paper has some real unique properties 398 00:18:45,150 --> 00:18:47,280 even if it's just plain, brown paper 399 00:18:47,280 --> 00:18:49,790 like you get in grocery bags. 400 00:18:49,790 --> 00:18:51,480 We're going to look at that. 401 00:18:51,480 --> 00:18:54,570 Composites-- they're all over the map. 402 00:18:54,570 --> 00:18:56,220 The only real composite I saw here 403 00:18:56,220 --> 00:19:01,620 was the bubble pack with Mylar, so it was a foilized plastic. 404 00:19:01,620 --> 00:19:05,220 And I'll tell you right now, that one doesn't read. 405 00:19:05,220 --> 00:19:09,150 It's a good insulator for RF energy. 406 00:19:09,150 --> 00:19:12,480 Problematic matching has come up because sometimes, you 407 00:19:12,480 --> 00:19:16,950 have packaging and water-based products. 408 00:19:16,950 --> 00:19:21,210 Water is particularly problematic with UHF. 409 00:19:21,210 --> 00:19:23,280 If you move to a different frequency, 410 00:19:23,280 --> 00:19:29,220 the water issue can decrease so that it becomes more friendly. 411 00:19:29,220 --> 00:19:32,370 They use energy through the Earth 412 00:19:32,370 --> 00:19:34,770 to communicate with submarines. 413 00:19:34,770 --> 00:19:37,920 We got a 500-mile-long antenna buried in the upper peninsula 414 00:19:37,920 --> 00:19:42,088 of Michigan so that they can use frequencies through water 415 00:19:42,088 --> 00:19:43,380 to communicate with submarines. 416 00:19:43,380 --> 00:19:45,540 You can use it, but it has to be really 417 00:19:45,540 --> 00:19:47,250 low in that particular case. 418 00:19:47,250 --> 00:19:49,350 The lower you go, the better it works. 419 00:19:49,350 --> 00:19:53,660 But not all liquids are water. 420 00:19:53,660 --> 00:19:58,410 If you think about it, how many of you put water in your car? 421 00:19:58,410 --> 00:20:03,090 I hope it goes into your washers rather than your fuel tank 422 00:20:03,090 --> 00:20:04,380 because there's a difference. 423 00:20:04,380 --> 00:20:06,270 Gasoline doesn't have water in it. 424 00:20:06,270 --> 00:20:08,760 Your gas engine doesn't like it. 425 00:20:08,760 --> 00:20:12,160 Motor oil does not have water in it. 426 00:20:12,160 --> 00:20:14,460 And so if you take those liquids, 427 00:20:14,460 --> 00:20:17,600 RF can go through those. 428 00:20:17,600 --> 00:20:19,270 So water-based problems is. 429 00:20:19,270 --> 00:20:21,400 Any product put in metal packaging. 430 00:20:21,400 --> 00:20:24,070 So your product can be perfectly read, 431 00:20:24,070 --> 00:20:26,740 and if it goes into a package that doesn't work, 432 00:20:26,740 --> 00:20:28,400 you have problems. 433 00:20:28,400 --> 00:20:32,210 Now, the Cascade powdered soap that I mentioned earlier 434 00:20:32,210 --> 00:20:37,480 is a good example of a dry, granular product. 435 00:20:37,480 --> 00:20:39,790 Let's put it in a standard corrugated box. 436 00:20:39,790 --> 00:20:40,990 Will it read or not read? 437 00:20:40,990 --> 00:20:42,070 What do you think? 438 00:20:42,070 --> 00:20:44,040 Read? 439 00:20:44,040 --> 00:20:46,060 Not read? 440 00:20:46,060 --> 00:20:47,700 Doesn't read. 441 00:20:47,700 --> 00:20:48,930 Why? 442 00:20:48,930 --> 00:20:50,923 It's not the water. 443 00:20:50,923 --> 00:20:52,590 One of the things you don't think about. 444 00:20:52,590 --> 00:20:56,100 Heavy iron content in the soap. 445 00:20:56,100 --> 00:20:59,590 And hence, it scatters the RF all over the place. 446 00:20:59,590 --> 00:21:03,810 So you can't generally read through a powdered soap. 447 00:21:03,810 --> 00:21:05,220 Who'd have thunk? 448 00:21:05,220 --> 00:21:06,780 Just looking up here, we have meats. 449 00:21:06,780 --> 00:21:09,030 We've been testing meats. 450 00:21:09,030 --> 00:21:09,660 Silly thing. 451 00:21:09,660 --> 00:21:11,400 Water-based I talked about? 452 00:21:11,400 --> 00:21:14,100 This is a TI. 453 00:21:14,100 --> 00:21:16,110 That's a 13.56 tag. 454 00:21:16,110 --> 00:21:18,360 We also tested it with 9.15. 455 00:21:18,360 --> 00:21:19,688 Single cut of beef. 456 00:21:19,688 --> 00:21:21,480 And by the way, it was steak, and damn good 457 00:21:21,480 --> 00:21:24,660 when we were done testing. 458 00:21:24,660 --> 00:21:26,610 We ran them at chilled temperatures 459 00:21:26,610 --> 00:21:28,860 and we ran them at frozen temperatures 460 00:21:28,860 --> 00:21:34,830 13.56, six you could read two or three stacked in a column 461 00:21:34,830 --> 00:21:36,990 and still be able to read through. 462 00:21:36,990 --> 00:21:39,720 UHF, you could read the top one, and that was it. 463 00:21:39,720 --> 00:21:41,910 Wouldn't penetrate to the bottom. 464 00:21:41,910 --> 00:21:45,510 When we froze those same cuts from each with the same tags, 465 00:21:45,510 --> 00:21:51,990 we could read five and six deep because the water molecules get 466 00:21:51,990 --> 00:21:54,900 bound up as ice crystals, and they leave gaps for RF 467 00:21:54,900 --> 00:21:55,920 to go through. 468 00:21:55,920 --> 00:21:59,440 So you can read frozen a lot of times with water. 469 00:21:59,440 --> 00:22:02,400 And for those of you that care, it's dielectric constant. 470 00:22:02,400 --> 00:22:04,620 If you look at dielectric constant of water, 471 00:22:04,620 --> 00:22:07,420 it's 70 to 80 depending on the properties involved. 472 00:22:07,420 --> 00:22:12,210 If you look at the dielectric constant of ice, 3.5. 473 00:22:12,210 --> 00:22:13,290 Right through it. 474 00:22:13,290 --> 00:22:14,250 So pretty good stuff. 475 00:22:17,305 --> 00:22:18,180 Some of the research. 476 00:22:18,180 --> 00:22:20,970 I just want to touch on these real briefly. 477 00:22:20,970 --> 00:22:25,110 Somebody give me a five minute sign when it's five minutes. 478 00:22:25,110 --> 00:22:26,130 Warehouse environment. 479 00:22:26,130 --> 00:22:28,440 This was starting way back when we first-- 480 00:22:28,440 --> 00:22:30,160 where in the heck do you use this stuff? 481 00:22:30,160 --> 00:22:32,242 And so back in '99, we started this research. 482 00:22:32,242 --> 00:22:34,200 Well, let's see if we can use it in a warehouse 483 00:22:34,200 --> 00:22:36,510 in developing a model for it. 484 00:22:36,510 --> 00:22:38,520 Transponder effects on bloom time. 485 00:22:38,520 --> 00:22:40,650 That meat study, the first one we looked at, 486 00:22:40,650 --> 00:22:45,630 because the inlay was printed on PET, 487 00:22:45,630 --> 00:22:49,680 if you put that on the surface over the meat, 488 00:22:49,680 --> 00:22:51,960 even though it was on the plastic over the meat, 489 00:22:51,960 --> 00:22:53,610 it created a double barrier. 490 00:22:53,610 --> 00:22:56,370 And when you peeled the plastic off of the meat, 491 00:22:56,370 --> 00:22:59,490 you had a big purple spot there because meat 492 00:22:59,490 --> 00:23:02,730 turns red during oxygenation. 493 00:23:02,730 --> 00:23:04,530 And so when you peel the tag off, 494 00:23:04,530 --> 00:23:06,570 because you have an oxygen barrier on top, 495 00:23:06,570 --> 00:23:08,460 you left a big purple splotch. 496 00:23:08,460 --> 00:23:11,280 And people were returning meats to the store saying, 497 00:23:11,280 --> 00:23:12,960 this crap is spoiled. 498 00:23:12,960 --> 00:23:15,390 And yet, if they waited 20 minutes, 499 00:23:15,390 --> 00:23:20,890 it would disappear because the meat becomes oxygenated. 500 00:23:20,890 --> 00:23:22,815 Frozen and refrigerated temperatures. 501 00:23:22,815 --> 00:23:23,690 I just gave you that. 502 00:23:23,690 --> 00:23:24,700 That's John [INAUDIBLE]. 503 00:23:24,700 --> 00:23:28,600 He's now at Kimberly-Clark, an EPC member 504 00:23:28,600 --> 00:23:32,530 and a task group on something. 505 00:23:32,530 --> 00:23:37,240 Jeff Taslar, now with Simon, wherever Simon went. 506 00:23:37,240 --> 00:23:40,510 Effects of tag orientation and package content on readability. 507 00:23:40,510 --> 00:23:44,140 I have a slide on this that I'll share with you shortly. 508 00:23:44,140 --> 00:23:46,690 Failure modes of class 0 in the lab. 509 00:23:46,690 --> 00:23:53,830 When you look at ISTA, the Institute of-- 510 00:23:53,830 --> 00:23:56,590 International Safe Transit Association. 511 00:23:56,590 --> 00:23:57,640 Excuse me. 512 00:23:57,640 --> 00:24:01,860 Mental burp. 513 00:24:01,860 --> 00:24:07,290 They run a series of dynamic tests that UPS, FedEx, DHL, 514 00:24:07,290 --> 00:24:10,380 may use for liability issues if something 515 00:24:10,380 --> 00:24:11,610 goes wrong with your package. 516 00:24:11,610 --> 00:24:14,880 They beat the hell out of it, and the product has to survive. 517 00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:17,710 That's their test in a nutshell. 518 00:24:17,710 --> 00:24:21,060 Now, American Society of Testing Materials, ASTM, 519 00:24:21,060 --> 00:24:22,920 also has a series of tests. 520 00:24:22,920 --> 00:24:24,430 Shock, vibration, compression. 521 00:24:24,430 --> 00:24:27,210 And you can build your own distribution to fine tune 522 00:24:27,210 --> 00:24:28,650 so you don't over package. 523 00:24:28,650 --> 00:24:32,880 We did both test side by side with the same tags. 524 00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:35,100 And one of the interesting things we found 525 00:24:35,100 --> 00:24:37,560 was that it was really hard to kill them 526 00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:43,710 in transit, unless there is a direct impact to the chip. 527 00:24:43,710 --> 00:24:47,100 The chips were not affected by vibration, which surprised me. 528 00:24:47,100 --> 00:24:49,110 They were not affected by shock. 529 00:24:49,110 --> 00:24:51,210 And also, the shock was directly over the chip. 530 00:24:51,210 --> 00:24:54,570 And it's a brittle piece of silicon, glass, so it breaks. 531 00:24:54,570 --> 00:24:56,385 And here's why I did this earlier. 532 00:24:56,385 --> 00:24:59,910 A little trivia for you. 533 00:24:59,910 --> 00:25:04,590 It makes a difference for survivability 534 00:25:04,590 --> 00:25:14,660 whether the chip on a tag is over the peak, over the slope, 535 00:25:14,660 --> 00:25:15,860 or over the valley. 536 00:25:21,260 --> 00:25:24,935 Try and plan that into your automated system. 537 00:25:28,190 --> 00:25:29,596 Yes. 538 00:25:29,596 --> 00:25:32,554 [LAUGHING] 539 00:25:33,540 --> 00:25:36,630 I'll tell you later. 540 00:25:36,630 --> 00:25:40,320 And we just finished one antenna configurations 541 00:25:40,320 --> 00:25:42,540 looking at product and tag types. 542 00:25:42,540 --> 00:25:45,600 And we evaluated with the same readers, 543 00:25:45,600 --> 00:25:47,040 and we looked at multiple readers. 544 00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:49,320 We looked at multiple classes of tags. 545 00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:53,100 Whether one antenna, two antennae, three antennae, 546 00:25:53,100 --> 00:25:56,370 or four antennae gave better results. 547 00:25:56,370 --> 00:25:59,190 And we looked at both linear and circular 548 00:25:59,190 --> 00:26:01,440 for different product mixes. 549 00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:03,408 So real interesting. 550 00:26:03,408 --> 00:26:05,700 We hope to have that one published shortly because it's 551 00:26:05,700 --> 00:26:07,860 a fascinating study. 552 00:26:07,860 --> 00:26:09,600 One that's going on right now. 553 00:26:09,600 --> 00:26:14,220 And Richard-- he disappeared. 554 00:26:14,220 --> 00:26:16,020 This is what I wanted to talk to him about. 555 00:26:16,020 --> 00:26:18,840 Electromagnetic property measurement and RF signal 556 00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:22,470 absorption, evaluation for product stimulant. 557 00:26:22,470 --> 00:26:24,850 I love these titles because they don't mean anything. 558 00:26:24,850 --> 00:26:34,590 But we are evaluating how much the materials downgrade moving 559 00:26:34,590 --> 00:26:37,200 through various materials because they all 560 00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:39,417 have a different-- if you look at a freeze equation, 561 00:26:39,417 --> 00:26:41,500 for those of you that know what I'm talking about, 562 00:26:41,500 --> 00:26:43,030 you have a signal strength. 563 00:26:43,030 --> 00:26:46,110 And when it reaches a barrier, if it's a packaging material, 564 00:26:46,110 --> 00:26:49,440 you'll get a lessening as it crosses that barrier. 565 00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:51,510 And you can actually measure these. 566 00:26:51,510 --> 00:26:53,580 And we developed some new equipment to do that. 567 00:26:53,580 --> 00:26:56,530 And that's coming up pretty interesting. 568 00:26:56,530 --> 00:26:59,160 And then we did one on Department 569 00:26:59,160 --> 00:27:01,110 of Defense's RFID mandates. 570 00:27:01,110 --> 00:27:02,190 Blah, blah, blah. 571 00:27:02,190 --> 00:27:05,440 This is the chart that's kind of interesting. 572 00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:09,220 On the one side here with the product, 573 00:27:09,220 --> 00:27:12,510 you'll see that I have empty foam, empty bottles, rice, 574 00:27:12,510 --> 00:27:13,620 and water bottles. 575 00:27:13,620 --> 00:27:19,170 Those are 12 by 12 by 12-inch cases, cubic foot, 576 00:27:19,170 --> 00:27:22,680 with nothing in them, foam in them 577 00:27:22,680 --> 00:27:26,490 only because we are looking at some of the shipping uses. 578 00:27:26,490 --> 00:27:31,560 Empty PET bottles, rice in PET bottles, 579 00:27:31,560 --> 00:27:34,890 and filled water bottles, the same PET. 580 00:27:34,890 --> 00:27:38,190 And if you start going across, the tag orientation at the top 581 00:27:38,190 --> 00:27:41,070 says outward-facing tags, where we had as many tags 582 00:27:41,070 --> 00:27:42,750 facing outward as we could. 583 00:27:42,750 --> 00:27:44,340 Inward-facing tags. 584 00:27:44,340 --> 00:27:46,350 You'll see problems there. 585 00:27:46,350 --> 00:27:48,810 Forward-facing tags on the pallet. 586 00:27:48,810 --> 00:27:52,290 Upward-facing tags on the pallet, and bottom-based tags 587 00:27:52,290 --> 00:27:53,730 on the pallet. 588 00:27:53,730 --> 00:27:56,730 One of the DHL movies which I thought 589 00:27:56,730 --> 00:28:00,030 was interesting, when they left the tag on the product 590 00:28:00,030 --> 00:28:02,460 in the loading dock and the guy had to stop and run 591 00:28:02,460 --> 00:28:05,700 back and get it, the tag was sitting on the side 592 00:28:05,700 --> 00:28:07,410 so the reader could pick it up. 593 00:28:07,410 --> 00:28:09,870 If you took that same package and turn that tag down 594 00:28:09,870 --> 00:28:13,290 on the floor, chances are the reader wouldn't get it. 595 00:28:13,290 --> 00:28:14,880 Why? 596 00:28:14,880 --> 00:28:16,703 There's metal in the floor. 597 00:28:16,703 --> 00:28:18,120 Because when you build facilities, 598 00:28:18,120 --> 00:28:19,350 you put rebar down there. 599 00:28:19,350 --> 00:28:21,750 It scatters waves all over hell. 600 00:28:21,750 --> 00:28:25,770 So anyway, this just shows that the wait are good reads. 601 00:28:25,770 --> 00:28:29,970 This is 1,200 reads for each test. 602 00:28:29,970 --> 00:28:32,790 Each box is 1,200 reads. 603 00:28:32,790 --> 00:28:33,870 Percentages of reads. 604 00:28:33,870 --> 00:28:35,820 And you can see that the white to the red, 605 00:28:35,820 --> 00:28:38,190 you had orientation issues. 606 00:28:38,190 --> 00:28:41,070 Not a lot, but statistically significant. 607 00:28:41,070 --> 00:28:45,180 And in the product categories, as you moved across, 608 00:28:45,180 --> 00:28:47,460 you had certain orientations of the tags 609 00:28:47,460 --> 00:28:49,830 on cases that were problematic. 610 00:28:49,830 --> 00:28:51,810 And when you looked at both of those areas, 611 00:28:51,810 --> 00:28:55,960 the orange squares up there did come out orange. 612 00:28:55,960 --> 00:28:57,640 Real problems. 613 00:28:57,640 --> 00:29:00,430 Packaging and product issues that affect 614 00:29:00,430 --> 00:29:03,640 RFID readability, transmission, any number 615 00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:05,530 of words you want to put in there. 616 00:29:05,530 --> 00:29:07,858 Now, again, this is Richards, and I won't-- 617 00:29:07,858 --> 00:29:09,400 this is some of the stuff we're doing 618 00:29:09,400 --> 00:29:11,110 on the electromagnetic properties 619 00:29:11,110 --> 00:29:13,180 and being able to measure energy that 620 00:29:13,180 --> 00:29:17,140 gets through packaging to a tag and being 621 00:29:17,140 --> 00:29:18,940 able to measure how much energy it takes 622 00:29:18,940 --> 00:29:20,980 to breach the threshold for a passive tag 623 00:29:20,980 --> 00:29:22,510 to send a signal back. 624 00:29:22,510 --> 00:29:25,510 And it's neat. 625 00:29:25,510 --> 00:29:28,220 We can talk about that later. 626 00:29:28,220 --> 00:29:31,690 Now, corrugated board. 627 00:29:31,690 --> 00:29:37,630 When you add humidity to paper, so hydroscopic paper, 628 00:29:37,630 --> 00:29:39,790 it absorbs moisture to some level. 629 00:29:39,790 --> 00:29:41,800 It changes the moisture content. 630 00:29:41,800 --> 00:29:44,452 And if you see here, we have storage conditions. 631 00:29:44,452 --> 00:29:45,910 Three different storage conditions, 632 00:29:45,910 --> 00:29:49,400 three different moisture content associated with that. 633 00:29:49,400 --> 00:29:50,740 And guess what happens? 634 00:29:50,740 --> 00:29:53,710 As you go up in moisture content, . 635 00:29:53,710 --> 00:29:58,010 You start having an effect on the paper. 636 00:29:58,010 --> 00:30:02,470 Now, it doesn't look like much, but what it boils down 637 00:30:02,470 --> 00:30:10,570 to is corrugated board or any other paper can affect RFID. 638 00:30:10,570 --> 00:30:11,845 It does not say it will. 639 00:30:11,845 --> 00:30:13,450 It does not say it has to. 640 00:30:13,450 --> 00:30:18,110 It can when you have high humidity. 641 00:30:18,110 --> 00:30:21,790 If you have low to medium humidity but the paper 642 00:30:21,790 --> 00:30:24,550 has already been exposed to high humidity. 643 00:30:24,550 --> 00:30:26,050 Hysteresis is this thing-- 644 00:30:26,050 --> 00:30:28,330 Mark and I had a conference in Tokyo 645 00:30:28,330 --> 00:30:30,640 where we discussed this very topic. 646 00:30:30,640 --> 00:30:36,190 When you change a paper's chemistry by adding moisture 647 00:30:36,190 --> 00:30:38,350 and then dry it out, it never goes back 648 00:30:38,350 --> 00:30:40,000 to the same static condition. 649 00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:41,590 There's always a residual there. 650 00:30:41,590 --> 00:30:43,990 So it's easier to pick up moisture the second time 651 00:30:43,990 --> 00:30:45,500 around. 652 00:30:45,500 --> 00:30:48,310 So with leakage or condensation, that's an issue. 653 00:30:48,310 --> 00:30:49,900 If you guys are trying to ship down 654 00:30:49,900 --> 00:30:54,520 to help Katrina in the southern coast 655 00:30:54,520 --> 00:30:58,750 where it literally rains inside of warehouses in the summer, 656 00:30:58,750 --> 00:31:01,010 this could be an issue. 657 00:31:01,010 --> 00:31:03,190 However-- and here's an interesting point. 658 00:31:03,190 --> 00:31:05,170 I hear this a lot in my presentations. 659 00:31:05,170 --> 00:31:06,820 That means we should go to RPCs. 660 00:31:06,820 --> 00:31:08,290 Returnable Plastic Containers. 661 00:31:08,290 --> 00:31:10,720 Or actually, there's about five acronyms for RPCs 662 00:31:10,720 --> 00:31:13,360 depending on the industry you're talking to. 663 00:31:13,360 --> 00:31:16,300 And here's one of the things that I find with that. 664 00:31:16,300 --> 00:31:18,010 If you do-- and you can. 665 00:31:18,010 --> 00:31:20,050 They'll go, you can embed the tank. 666 00:31:20,050 --> 00:31:21,370 Absolutely right. 667 00:31:21,370 --> 00:31:21,990 No question. 668 00:31:21,990 --> 00:31:23,740 You can embed the tag, and it's protected. 669 00:31:23,740 --> 00:31:24,820 Those are good things. 670 00:31:24,820 --> 00:31:28,060 You can embed the tag in corrugated, too. 671 00:31:28,060 --> 00:31:28,955 I don't know. 672 00:31:28,955 --> 00:31:29,830 I have to look ahead. 673 00:31:29,830 --> 00:31:30,970 Don't look. 674 00:31:30,970 --> 00:31:33,820 OK, good. 675 00:31:33,820 --> 00:31:36,130 If you embed the tag in corrugated, 676 00:31:36,130 --> 00:31:39,050 there's a problem with that inherently from an operations 677 00:31:39,050 --> 00:31:42,070 standpoint because you embed it, and those of you that 678 00:31:42,070 --> 00:31:43,570 have been in a corrugated plant, you 679 00:31:43,570 --> 00:31:45,430 see this stuff whipping off. 680 00:31:45,430 --> 00:31:47,470 And you place tags every so often. 681 00:31:47,470 --> 00:31:51,830 You then have to die cut to get that box plank. 682 00:31:51,830 --> 00:31:55,820 And if you're changing the dye, you 683 00:31:55,820 --> 00:31:58,350 don't know what's going to happen to that tag. 684 00:31:58,350 --> 00:32:00,110 So that's really problematic. 685 00:32:00,110 --> 00:32:04,130 That means you end up having to inventory 8 foot 686 00:32:04,130 --> 00:32:10,040 sheets of board rather than dye cute blanks or dye cut boxes. 687 00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:13,400 That's a huge amount of space increase. 688 00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:15,630 Now, the other thing that-- 689 00:32:15,630 --> 00:32:16,130 OK. 690 00:32:16,130 --> 00:32:18,710 With RPCs, I'll cover that in a second. 691 00:32:18,710 --> 00:32:19,918 Don't let me forget. 692 00:32:19,918 --> 00:32:21,710 These are just some of our test conditions. 693 00:32:21,710 --> 00:32:24,290 We have loading docks at the school. 694 00:32:24,290 --> 00:32:25,790 And in the bottom corner over here, 695 00:32:25,790 --> 00:32:27,590 you'll see one of my labs. 696 00:32:27,590 --> 00:32:29,060 And I run that-- 697 00:32:29,060 --> 00:32:31,550 I just put the corrugated up to make it look clean 698 00:32:31,550 --> 00:32:33,620 because it's a dirty lab, if you will, 699 00:32:33,620 --> 00:32:36,300 literally and figuratively. 700 00:32:36,300 --> 00:32:38,240 But we'll turn on all the equipment 701 00:32:38,240 --> 00:32:41,810 and see what electromagnetic interference does with respect 702 00:32:41,810 --> 00:32:45,050 to different tag and reader combinations. 703 00:32:45,050 --> 00:32:46,730 We did shock testing. 704 00:32:46,730 --> 00:32:48,920 So we're doing drops on here. 705 00:32:48,920 --> 00:32:51,693 Here's a vibration test unit load, as well as 706 00:32:51,693 --> 00:32:54,110 column stack where we're trying to get the columns rubbing 707 00:32:54,110 --> 00:32:56,420 against each other to see if we could braid through 708 00:32:56,420 --> 00:32:58,160 to destroy the chip. 709 00:32:58,160 --> 00:32:59,600 Compression tests. 710 00:32:59,600 --> 00:33:01,460 You can do these all day long. 711 00:33:01,460 --> 00:33:04,970 Nothing ever happens, but they're cool to look at. 712 00:33:04,970 --> 00:33:06,980 Now, here's some issues that we also 713 00:33:06,980 --> 00:33:10,770 found in looking at a lot of product package combinations. 714 00:33:10,770 --> 00:33:13,160 This is a seven-down footprint. 715 00:33:13,160 --> 00:33:15,290 Four and three cases. 716 00:33:15,290 --> 00:33:21,380 And the white means you got 100% reads in 25 trials 717 00:33:21,380 --> 00:33:22,850 going through a portal. 718 00:33:22,850 --> 00:33:26,540 And you have the red with various percentages up there. 719 00:33:26,540 --> 00:33:29,720 Those tags didn't read, but they're all perimeter tags, 720 00:33:29,720 --> 00:33:34,510 and they didn't read because metal forklift blocked 721 00:33:34,510 --> 00:33:35,910 the RF from getting to them. 722 00:33:35,910 --> 00:33:36,910 I don't have it in here. 723 00:33:36,910 --> 00:33:38,368 We did a lot of studies on how much 724 00:33:38,368 --> 00:33:41,308 room do you need to measure in that gap and reflect off, 725 00:33:41,308 --> 00:33:42,100 but it's different. 726 00:33:42,100 --> 00:33:45,160 Now, on the bottom is the exact same product, 727 00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:47,530 the exact same cases and tags, but I 728 00:33:47,530 --> 00:33:50,890 changed the stacking pattern. 729 00:33:50,890 --> 00:33:56,140 I agree it is a stacking pattern that rhymes with shit. 730 00:33:56,140 --> 00:33:57,430 It's a terrible pattern. 731 00:33:57,430 --> 00:33:59,080 You'd never use this. 732 00:33:59,080 --> 00:34:01,960 However, my point was to demonstrate 733 00:34:01,960 --> 00:34:04,180 that if you change stacking patterns, 734 00:34:04,180 --> 00:34:07,060 it can impact readability. 735 00:34:07,060 --> 00:34:09,610 That's all I wanted to prove. 736 00:34:09,610 --> 00:34:13,780 Now, here's one where the green is the tag 737 00:34:13,780 --> 00:34:15,620 location on these cases. 738 00:34:15,620 --> 00:34:19,719 And we have the same orientation, the same patterns. 739 00:34:19,719 --> 00:34:23,139 And I just turned the tags inward rather than leaving them 740 00:34:23,139 --> 00:34:24,280 at the perimeter. 741 00:34:24,280 --> 00:34:28,510 And those red reads, 25 trials, not a single time 742 00:34:28,510 --> 00:34:29,230 that case read. 743 00:34:29,230 --> 00:34:33,670 These are individual tiers stacked on top of each other. 744 00:34:33,670 --> 00:34:36,969 Same with the bottom ones, even though you have the channels 745 00:34:36,969 --> 00:34:40,570 into the tags. 746 00:34:40,570 --> 00:34:42,639 Now, here's just kind of a reversed. 747 00:34:42,639 --> 00:34:45,010 All perimeter tags on the top one. 748 00:34:45,010 --> 00:34:47,380 Good readability, like no failures. 749 00:34:47,380 --> 00:34:48,940 That's real handy. 750 00:34:48,940 --> 00:34:52,750 Inward-facing tags-- death, except on the top where there 751 00:34:52,750 --> 00:34:54,280 was no case surrounding it. 752 00:34:54,280 --> 00:34:57,820 Now, what this means, and we've done a lot 753 00:34:57,820 --> 00:35:00,220 of talking on processes here. 754 00:35:00,220 --> 00:35:02,500 One of the processes that may have 755 00:35:02,500 --> 00:35:07,180 to occur before RFID enables all the benefits we're talking 756 00:35:07,180 --> 00:35:09,490 about in the supply chain is to look 757 00:35:09,490 --> 00:35:14,320 at changing the pallet patterns or case counts 758 00:35:14,320 --> 00:35:17,550 to maximize perimeter tagging. 759 00:35:17,550 --> 00:35:20,430 In the video that DHL showed, did anybody 760 00:35:20,430 --> 00:35:23,070 noticed that that pallet was a half pallet? 761 00:35:23,070 --> 00:35:26,670 It wasn't a typical GMA pallet like we use here 762 00:35:26,670 --> 00:35:27,600 in the United States. 763 00:35:27,600 --> 00:35:29,370 Grocery Manufacturers Association. 764 00:35:29,370 --> 00:35:31,320 A 40 by 48-inch pallet. 765 00:35:31,320 --> 00:35:32,310 It was a half pellet. 766 00:35:32,310 --> 00:35:33,810 And if you go through Europe, you'll 767 00:35:33,810 --> 00:35:35,670 also see quarter pallets. 768 00:35:35,670 --> 00:35:39,150 And one of the benefits of that system is you always-- 769 00:35:39,150 --> 00:35:40,140 almost always. 770 00:35:40,140 --> 00:35:43,740 Pretty much always get that perimeter tagging opportunity, 771 00:35:43,740 --> 00:35:47,480 and therefore, better readability. 772 00:35:47,480 --> 00:35:49,820 Now, product impact. 773 00:35:49,820 --> 00:35:53,240 Water, we tested some, and we found 774 00:35:53,240 --> 00:35:55,760 a case that would be readable, non-readable. 775 00:35:55,760 --> 00:35:57,080 Readable, non-readable. 776 00:35:57,080 --> 00:35:58,580 Nothing changed. 777 00:35:58,580 --> 00:35:59,690 What the hell's going on? 778 00:35:59,690 --> 00:36:01,460 I'm going crazy here, all right? 779 00:36:01,460 --> 00:36:04,490 What we found was we had heads of lettuce. 780 00:36:04,490 --> 00:36:08,120 And a head of lettuce would rotate and put 781 00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:13,220 a flat portion of the head on the back side of the case 782 00:36:13,220 --> 00:36:14,450 where the tag was. 783 00:36:14,450 --> 00:36:16,970 And if that hunk of water in a lettuce 784 00:36:16,970 --> 00:36:19,700 was up against the corrugated behind the tag, 785 00:36:19,700 --> 00:36:21,110 you can't read the tag. 786 00:36:21,110 --> 00:36:23,720 And that was demonstrated last night 787 00:36:23,720 --> 00:36:27,380 with the different thicknesses on the water with Dan. 788 00:36:27,380 --> 00:36:31,010 When you rotated the tray full of water, 789 00:36:31,010 --> 00:36:32,720 you needed additional thicknesses 790 00:36:32,720 --> 00:36:35,480 because you need to separate the tag from the water 791 00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:39,680 to allow the signal to get in and energize the antennae. 792 00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:41,522 And here's a perfect example. 793 00:36:41,522 --> 00:36:42,480 We found it in lettuce. 794 00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:43,550 We found it in peaches. 795 00:36:43,550 --> 00:36:46,700 We found it in a couple of different products. 796 00:36:46,700 --> 00:36:52,890 We started looking at reading on shrinkwrap situation. 797 00:36:52,890 --> 00:36:54,410 Stretch wrap, excuse me. 798 00:36:54,410 --> 00:36:57,170 And this is a portal that has four antennae. 799 00:36:57,170 --> 00:37:01,430 This is part of the antennae configuration and readability. 800 00:37:01,430 --> 00:37:03,890 And reading, wow, it's because it's 801 00:37:03,890 --> 00:37:09,440 on there for roughly 30 seconds while the stretch 802 00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:11,630 wrap is being put on. 803 00:37:11,630 --> 00:37:17,630 And we found some fun results, but that'll be out shortly, 804 00:37:17,630 --> 00:37:19,138 and I'll teach all of that. 805 00:37:19,138 --> 00:37:20,930 One of the things we're currently doing now 806 00:37:20,930 --> 00:37:22,760 is looking at water on corrugated. 807 00:37:22,760 --> 00:37:27,560 Corrugated has huge markets and opportunities within produce. 808 00:37:27,560 --> 00:37:29,070 No question about it. 809 00:37:29,070 --> 00:37:32,330 And here, we've started a series of tests on these. 810 00:37:32,330 --> 00:37:36,410 We have produce trays, and in the top, 811 00:37:36,410 --> 00:37:38,230 we just have a squeeze bottle. 812 00:37:38,230 --> 00:37:39,530 Real scientific. 813 00:37:39,530 --> 00:37:43,020 Cost me, I think, $0.89 to empty and fill up with water. 814 00:37:43,020 --> 00:37:46,130 And we spray on the tag. 815 00:37:46,130 --> 00:37:48,260 The one below that, we got a squeeze bottle. 816 00:37:48,260 --> 00:37:49,040 That was cheaper. 817 00:37:49,040 --> 00:37:52,880 That was, like, $0.39, and we just squeeze a stream on it. 818 00:37:52,880 --> 00:37:57,440 Now, on the top, we run the tap, and we have a calibrated hand 819 00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:00,740 splashing water across the tag, looking at different levels 820 00:38:00,740 --> 00:38:02,043 of moisture on the tag. 821 00:38:02,043 --> 00:38:03,710 And here's one of the interesting things 822 00:38:03,710 --> 00:38:04,670 that we found. 823 00:38:04,670 --> 00:38:11,160 If you have untreated board, any water on the tag, the tag 824 00:38:11,160 --> 00:38:11,940 disappears. 825 00:38:11,940 --> 00:38:14,130 You can't read it. 826 00:38:14,130 --> 00:38:15,900 And in the bottom picture, you see 827 00:38:15,900 --> 00:38:17,880 how the water has worked its way into some 828 00:38:17,880 --> 00:38:20,920 of the holes of the case. 829 00:38:20,920 --> 00:38:22,180 It holds moisture. 830 00:38:22,180 --> 00:38:23,460 You still have problems. 831 00:38:23,460 --> 00:38:26,790 And you can't always read those after the water application 832 00:38:26,790 --> 00:38:27,970 stops. 833 00:38:27,970 --> 00:38:31,560 However, if you have treated board 834 00:38:31,560 --> 00:38:36,040 and you do this exact test, as soon as you stop the water, 835 00:38:36,040 --> 00:38:40,690 whether it's a spray, a squeeze bottle, or a flood of water, 836 00:38:40,690 --> 00:38:43,530 the second you stop that water that drains, 837 00:38:43,530 --> 00:38:45,330 that tag reads again. 838 00:38:45,330 --> 00:38:48,810 That is no different than a tag embedded 839 00:38:48,810 --> 00:38:51,090 in a returnable plastic container. 840 00:38:51,090 --> 00:38:56,070 If you run water over those, the tags still disappears. 841 00:38:56,070 --> 00:38:59,250 There's no magic that if you bury a tag in plastic, 842 00:38:59,250 --> 00:39:02,460 you can still spray it with water and get the tag to read. 843 00:39:02,460 --> 00:39:04,223 You can spray it with water for cleaning. 844 00:39:04,223 --> 00:39:05,640 But here was an interesting thing. 845 00:39:05,640 --> 00:39:06,810 My wife is here with me. 846 00:39:06,810 --> 00:39:09,960 And I was talking to her about returnable containers, 847 00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:13,020 and she worked for a company in Dallas. 848 00:39:13,020 --> 00:39:16,320 We made a one-way container for a company, 849 00:39:16,320 --> 00:39:18,630 and it was electronic company in Dallas. 850 00:39:18,630 --> 00:39:21,210 They came back a year later and wanted 851 00:39:21,210 --> 00:39:23,640 us to rebuild this corrugated box, 852 00:39:23,640 --> 00:39:26,310 and it was about the length and width this table. 853 00:39:26,310 --> 00:39:27,630 About this deep. 854 00:39:27,630 --> 00:39:32,020 They had used it every week for a shipment to a plant 855 00:39:32,020 --> 00:39:34,350 and back for a year, and then they 856 00:39:34,350 --> 00:39:36,960 asked them to rebuild it rather than a new one. 857 00:39:36,960 --> 00:39:38,520 Out of corrugated. 858 00:39:38,520 --> 00:39:42,930 Now, it was triple wall, but there is a good reusable. 859 00:39:42,930 --> 00:39:47,040 Frito-Lay uses returnable corrugated boxes 860 00:39:47,040 --> 00:39:49,387 for all of their chips because they control 861 00:39:49,387 --> 00:39:50,970 the placement on the shelves, and then 862 00:39:50,970 --> 00:39:52,887 they tick the boxes back, and they reuse them, 863 00:39:52,887 --> 00:39:54,870 and they can reuse them for months at a time 864 00:39:54,870 --> 00:39:56,190 because they don't get beat up. 865 00:39:56,190 --> 00:39:57,640 Some good opportunities. 866 00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:00,780 Now, There's what we talked about. 867 00:40:00,780 --> 00:40:02,220 Read stopped during water. 868 00:40:02,220 --> 00:40:05,280 They'll continue to fail if it becomes saturated, 869 00:40:05,280 --> 00:40:08,190 but they resume failing if it's treated. 870 00:40:08,190 --> 00:40:14,580 And with that, I'm going to sit down and start drinking, 871 00:40:14,580 --> 00:40:17,565 and I'm going to turn this over to Dr. [INAUDIBLE] 872 00:40:17,565 --> 00:40:19,050 from Florida. 873 00:40:19,050 --> 00:40:22,880 Appreciate your time and attention. 874 00:40:22,880 --> 00:40:26,268 [APPLAUSE] 875 00:40:34,020 --> 00:40:38,010 [INAUDIBLE] 876 00:40:38,010 --> 00:40:40,010 PROFESSOR 2: I'm very sorry for some of you that 877 00:40:40,010 --> 00:40:42,420 were done with me yesterday. 878 00:40:42,420 --> 00:40:43,200 I'm always back. 879 00:40:43,200 --> 00:40:44,220 It's like a bad cold. 880 00:40:44,220 --> 00:40:46,740 I always come back. 881 00:40:46,740 --> 00:40:48,750 I'm going to go fast because we have lunch, 882 00:40:48,750 --> 00:40:53,770 and so I'm sorry [INAUDIBLE] listening. 883 00:40:53,770 --> 00:40:54,270 OK. 884 00:40:54,270 --> 00:40:55,260 Well, thank you again. 885 00:40:55,260 --> 00:40:57,780 And we are going to talk about packaging 886 00:40:57,780 --> 00:41:02,010 and a few of the thing that Rob discussed a little bit earlier, 887 00:41:02,010 --> 00:41:03,150 I'm going to dressed them. 888 00:41:03,150 --> 00:41:04,770 That's very interesting. 889 00:41:04,770 --> 00:41:06,660 Very quick, it's-- 890 00:41:06,660 --> 00:41:09,450 I explained about the Center for Production Retailing yesterday. 891 00:41:09,450 --> 00:41:11,580 And we are trying to develop smart packaging 892 00:41:11,580 --> 00:41:14,100 for the food industry and the pharmaceutical industry. 893 00:41:14,100 --> 00:41:16,500 And the one thing that we started 894 00:41:16,500 --> 00:41:19,110 is well in this area of RFID. 895 00:41:19,110 --> 00:41:22,830 This is what happened in 2003, when Fretwell, a company based 896 00:41:22,830 --> 00:41:24,730 in Plant City, Florida, came to us and said, 897 00:41:24,730 --> 00:41:26,188 we're going to give you an RFID lab 898 00:41:26,188 --> 00:41:27,640 and start to play with this thing. 899 00:41:27,640 --> 00:41:29,700 And the reason why it was a good mass for the food industry 900 00:41:29,700 --> 00:41:31,450 is because we have already infrastructure. 901 00:41:31,450 --> 00:41:33,610 We have 14 cold rooms, temperature, 902 00:41:33,610 --> 00:41:34,830 humidity programmable. 903 00:41:34,830 --> 00:41:36,220 And we have two freezers. 904 00:41:36,220 --> 00:41:38,340 We have two [INAUDIBLE] container. 905 00:41:38,340 --> 00:41:41,430 One refrigerated trailer, and even a 727 freighter 906 00:41:41,430 --> 00:41:44,700 that they don't allow me to fly, luckily for everybody. 907 00:41:44,700 --> 00:41:47,940 But the goal was, at that time, is 908 00:41:47,940 --> 00:41:51,330 that to get all the RFID hardware and software 909 00:41:51,330 --> 00:41:53,310 manufacturer to have a start there. 910 00:41:53,310 --> 00:41:54,900 And since then, every three months, 911 00:41:54,900 --> 00:41:58,750 they come and they upgrade our equipment, software, hardware. 912 00:41:58,750 --> 00:42:00,270 So that's pretty neat for that. 913 00:42:00,270 --> 00:42:04,710 We always get the new stuff pretty ahead. 914 00:42:04,710 --> 00:42:07,020 So our lab is designed like Rob. 915 00:42:07,020 --> 00:42:11,063 We have everything to measure all the impact of packaging 916 00:42:11,063 --> 00:42:11,730 and things like. 917 00:42:11,730 --> 00:42:12,750 That you see, Rob? 918 00:42:12,750 --> 00:42:17,010 I use a drawing so I don't have to put the boards to hide 919 00:42:17,010 --> 00:42:18,780 my dirt under this thing. 920 00:42:18,780 --> 00:42:21,130 OK, so very quick. 921 00:42:21,130 --> 00:42:23,130 The first thing that we did was with [INAUDIBLE] 922 00:42:23,130 --> 00:42:26,190 and Fresh Express, prepared salad and a head of lettuce. 923 00:42:26,190 --> 00:42:27,900 And we did shipping from coast to coast. 924 00:42:27,900 --> 00:42:30,812 Studied the tag location, and then the speed of the load. 925 00:42:30,812 --> 00:42:32,020 I'm going to go fast on that. 926 00:42:32,020 --> 00:42:35,790 The idea was to map a pallet and see where are the good place 927 00:42:35,790 --> 00:42:38,250 to put a tag and the other place that were critical not put 928 00:42:38,250 --> 00:42:39,667 a tag because you couldn't read it 929 00:42:39,667 --> 00:42:41,192 because the effective of the pallet. 930 00:42:41,192 --> 00:42:42,900 So we played for it with that for a while 931 00:42:42,900 --> 00:42:46,323 until we decided that we have to go further with that. 932 00:42:46,323 --> 00:42:48,240 So we started to compare different materials-- 933 00:42:48,240 --> 00:42:53,760 plastic, wire bound, wooden crate, and corrugated boxes. 934 00:42:53,760 --> 00:42:56,850 And I apologize for the wood crate. 935 00:42:56,850 --> 00:42:59,850 I was still learning how to drive the Publix forklift. 936 00:42:59,850 --> 00:43:02,590 And the corners were pretty stiff on this thing. 937 00:43:02,590 --> 00:43:05,453 But the idea was to compare what was the effective if you're 938 00:43:05,453 --> 00:43:07,620 using because these are coming from the same grower, 939 00:43:07,620 --> 00:43:10,245 and they have different kind of packaging and things like that. 940 00:43:10,245 --> 00:43:11,520 So we wanted to study that. 941 00:43:11,520 --> 00:43:13,450 And we came with a different thing. 942 00:43:13,450 --> 00:43:15,540 But the problem that we discovered 943 00:43:15,540 --> 00:43:19,800 is that when people were looking for readability, read rate, 944 00:43:19,800 --> 00:43:21,660 we were having pretty low number. 945 00:43:21,660 --> 00:43:23,068 And they were like, oh, man. 946 00:43:23,068 --> 00:43:23,610 That's awful. 947 00:43:23,610 --> 00:43:26,160 But I said, welll, it's because we were losing the tag. 948 00:43:26,160 --> 00:43:28,630 You cannot read them if they are not there anymore. 949 00:43:28,630 --> 00:43:32,280 And we started to discover a lot of falling tags everywhere. 950 00:43:32,280 --> 00:43:34,600 And that was a big issue. 951 00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:36,930 One thing that we decided is that, why 952 00:43:36,930 --> 00:43:39,240 we don't look a little bit further and see 953 00:43:39,240 --> 00:43:41,490 when you pack something in a package, 954 00:43:41,490 --> 00:43:45,180 it should stay with the package, the RFID tag all the time, 955 00:43:45,180 --> 00:43:46,890 at least identification. 956 00:43:46,890 --> 00:43:50,310 And this is where it started to trigger that we should always 957 00:43:50,310 --> 00:43:54,390 try to improve the way of mixing tag, 958 00:43:54,390 --> 00:43:57,450 RFID tag with packaging by trying to know if we cannot, 959 00:43:57,450 --> 00:43:59,160 in the process of making the package, 960 00:43:59,160 --> 00:44:03,420 just get the RFID tags inside and make it one step rather 961 00:44:03,420 --> 00:44:04,720 than many steps. 962 00:44:04,720 --> 00:44:06,290 So we started to investigate that. 963 00:44:06,290 --> 00:44:07,950 So what we did is that we started 964 00:44:07,950 --> 00:44:11,610 to embed RFID tag on reusable plastic container. 965 00:44:11,610 --> 00:44:14,100 Of course, we reduced the use, the cost per use. 966 00:44:14,100 --> 00:44:15,600 So this tag is there. 967 00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:17,940 You cannot see it, but it's there. 968 00:44:17,940 --> 00:44:21,750 And that was doing with the injection molding plastic 969 00:44:21,750 --> 00:44:22,530 that we did that. 970 00:44:22,530 --> 00:44:25,297 So we can always track the base because the wall, 971 00:44:25,297 --> 00:44:26,130 you can change them. 972 00:44:26,130 --> 00:44:28,457 Because if you break one wall, you can change it. 973 00:44:28,457 --> 00:44:29,790 But the base is always the base. 974 00:44:29,790 --> 00:44:32,670 And so we can always track the life of these RPC 975 00:44:32,670 --> 00:44:34,920 because sometimes, they are used in different industry 976 00:44:34,920 --> 00:44:37,630 where you're trying to use them for different use. 977 00:44:37,630 --> 00:44:42,240 And so what we did during injection molding process, 978 00:44:42,240 --> 00:44:44,320 and it cannot be removed. 979 00:44:44,320 --> 00:44:46,200 But the interesting is that we were always 980 00:44:46,200 --> 00:44:48,120 wondering, when you inject plastic, 981 00:44:48,120 --> 00:44:51,150 it's very high temperature, and a lot of friction in the mold. 982 00:44:51,150 --> 00:44:54,450 And is a tag can survive that, and can we locate the tag 983 00:44:54,450 --> 00:44:55,410 at the right place. 984 00:44:55,410 --> 00:44:58,920 And if that happened, it was easier than we expected. 985 00:44:58,920 --> 00:45:00,090 They were very tough. 986 00:45:00,090 --> 00:45:01,950 And what is interesting is that I 987 00:45:01,950 --> 00:45:05,980 can cut pretty much the price of that by skipping a few steps. 988 00:45:05,980 --> 00:45:09,615 So I don't need a fancy RFID tag in this thing, 989 00:45:09,615 --> 00:45:10,740 and I don't need very much. 990 00:45:10,740 --> 00:45:12,780 In fact, we're going to see later, 991 00:45:12,780 --> 00:45:14,830 I only need the chips once in a while. 992 00:45:14,830 --> 00:45:16,890 So the price of the whole process is made. 993 00:45:16,890 --> 00:45:19,320 And this thing doesn't require any new equipment 994 00:45:19,320 --> 00:45:21,510 for the injection molding company. 995 00:45:21,510 --> 00:45:23,500 Any company can do that. 996 00:45:23,500 --> 00:45:25,800 So what we did was so we started to invest 997 00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:28,500 on smaller container, which was more 998 00:45:28,500 --> 00:45:31,470 challenging because the thickness of the chip 999 00:45:31,470 --> 00:45:34,240 is what is limit the thickness of my wall. 1000 00:45:34,240 --> 00:45:36,380 But you can always find a place to put it. 1001 00:45:36,380 --> 00:45:40,150 So as I said, we don't need these fancy labels. 1002 00:45:40,150 --> 00:45:42,640 We need a chip, and that's it. 1003 00:45:42,640 --> 00:45:44,180 And everybody can do it. 1004 00:45:44,180 --> 00:45:46,660 So that's pretty cheap at what point, OK? 1005 00:45:46,660 --> 00:45:49,990 So injection molding company can run 1006 00:45:49,990 --> 00:45:53,470 a batch of regular container and just switch 1007 00:45:53,470 --> 00:45:55,870 in a matter of a few seconds to with one 1008 00:45:55,870 --> 00:45:57,563 with embedded RFID tag. 1009 00:45:57,563 --> 00:45:59,230 And this is what we are doing right now. 1010 00:45:59,230 --> 00:46:01,510 Of course, everybody's like, oh, item level. 1011 00:46:01,510 --> 00:46:03,220 It's way too ahead, you know? 1012 00:46:03,220 --> 00:46:07,810 But it just proved that I can take RFID tag container 1013 00:46:07,810 --> 00:46:10,690 and put that in this container and drive the price 1014 00:46:10,690 --> 00:46:14,020 to very, very cheap to the price on most of the chip only. 1015 00:46:14,020 --> 00:46:16,480 So that's very interesting on that. 1016 00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:19,905 Well, and also, we started to do with project 1017 00:46:19,905 --> 00:46:21,280 with different nature of product. 1018 00:46:21,280 --> 00:46:25,360 And of course, because of the water and what we said, 1019 00:46:25,360 --> 00:46:28,660 one of the big issues that if I have my tag and with water, 1020 00:46:28,660 --> 00:46:29,680 I cannot read it. 1021 00:46:29,680 --> 00:46:31,960 So we sometimes, we have to redesign the package. 1022 00:46:31,960 --> 00:46:36,700 Not very much, but slight chance that I can position my RFID tag 1023 00:46:36,700 --> 00:46:38,770 to a location that it will not interfere 1024 00:46:38,770 --> 00:46:41,770 with being interpreted by the food that I put inside. 1025 00:46:41,770 --> 00:46:45,160 So we're able to pinpoint location and redesign 1026 00:46:45,160 --> 00:46:48,182 slightly some of these container and get these good read. 1027 00:46:48,182 --> 00:46:50,390 In fact, I'm going to tell you something interesting. 1028 00:46:50,390 --> 00:46:55,990 We did 1,000 container with tags embedded, and only one of them 1029 00:46:55,990 --> 00:46:56,980 failed. 1030 00:46:56,980 --> 00:46:58,570 All of them were good. 1031 00:46:58,570 --> 00:47:01,060 So that was pretty interesting on that. 1032 00:47:01,060 --> 00:47:04,090 What we are doing also in 2000, right now, 1033 00:47:04,090 --> 00:47:08,240 is that we are looking for smaller and thinner design. 1034 00:47:08,240 --> 00:47:10,820 Some of them, we just want to read 6 to 12 inches. 1035 00:47:10,820 --> 00:47:15,400 So we're going to need some help on the design, antenna 1036 00:47:15,400 --> 00:47:16,430 design on this thing. 1037 00:47:16,430 --> 00:47:20,500 So I'm just asking everybody to help. 1038 00:47:20,500 --> 00:47:22,270 On the pharma industry, well, this 1039 00:47:22,270 --> 00:47:25,930 is something interesting because your container, 1040 00:47:25,930 --> 00:47:27,610 if you put pills in it and you want 1041 00:47:27,610 --> 00:47:30,760 to follow that, I can remove a label. 1042 00:47:30,760 --> 00:47:32,710 But if it's inside the container, 1043 00:47:32,710 --> 00:47:34,120 I cannot remove the label. 1044 00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:35,500 It's inside the container. 1045 00:47:35,500 --> 00:47:38,050 I can stack it up with tons of label. 1046 00:47:38,050 --> 00:47:40,060 Well, it's still part of the container. 1047 00:47:40,060 --> 00:47:41,080 And we did that. 1048 00:47:41,080 --> 00:47:43,990 And sort of the thing is that prescription drug, using 1049 00:47:43,990 --> 00:47:46,990 [INAUDIBLE] container has been something 1050 00:47:46,990 --> 00:47:48,410 that we're working in pretty close 1051 00:47:48,410 --> 00:47:51,160 to be successful on this one. 1052 00:47:51,160 --> 00:47:53,710 And also, we work on the blood product 1053 00:47:53,710 --> 00:47:55,630 right now and packaging company that you 1054 00:47:55,630 --> 00:47:59,170 put in when you ship the pharmaceutical product 1055 00:47:59,170 --> 00:48:00,040 on this thing. 1056 00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:02,860 That was a fast presentation, but I'm 1057 00:48:02,860 --> 00:48:04,960 going to let you, after that, just doing 1058 00:48:04,960 --> 00:48:08,920 that, we're working very much, but we need some cooperation 1059 00:48:08,920 --> 00:48:09,480 also. 1060 00:48:09,480 --> 00:48:10,897 So thank you very much. 1061 00:48:10,897 --> 00:48:14,713 [APPLAUSE] 1062 00:48:18,060 --> 00:48:18,930 Once it's fast. 1063 00:48:25,070 --> 00:48:25,570 Thank you. 1064 00:48:28,490 --> 00:48:29,510 [INTERPOSING VOICES] 1065 00:48:29,510 --> 00:48:33,850 PROFESSOR 3: We'll do the Laurel, Hardy thing. 1066 00:48:33,850 --> 00:48:35,460 Jean-Pierre and I were talking. 1067 00:48:35,460 --> 00:48:37,460 We were going to have a race to see who could do 1068 00:48:37,460 --> 00:48:38,810 the presentation the fastest. 1069 00:48:38,810 --> 00:48:40,670 So I'm going to win on this one. 1070 00:48:40,670 --> 00:48:41,930 But all right. 1071 00:48:41,930 --> 00:48:44,720 I'm first going to tell you guys who we are 1072 00:48:44,720 --> 00:48:46,478 and why you should care. 1073 00:48:46,478 --> 00:48:48,020 Then I'm going to tell you about what 1074 00:48:48,020 --> 00:48:50,720 we're looking for out there as far as technology 1075 00:48:50,720 --> 00:48:52,400 and why we want that. 1076 00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:54,890 So we'll flip through. 1077 00:48:54,890 --> 00:48:57,590 Or once I figure out how to work this. 1078 00:48:57,590 --> 00:48:58,520 Ah. 1079 00:48:58,520 --> 00:48:59,810 MeadWestvaco. 1080 00:48:59,810 --> 00:49:03,290 We're into consumer packaging. 1081 00:49:03,290 --> 00:49:06,300 We're into three principal areas. 1082 00:49:06,300 --> 00:49:09,470 And if you look at these three principal areas 1083 00:49:09,470 --> 00:49:14,450 and you think about RFID and ubiquitous tagging, 1084 00:49:14,450 --> 00:49:17,240 these are three areas where they're 1085 00:49:17,240 --> 00:49:20,060 prime candidates for RFID. 1086 00:49:20,060 --> 00:49:22,070 The media and entertainment here, 1087 00:49:22,070 --> 00:49:25,910 you have these high-value items in small packages. 1088 00:49:25,910 --> 00:49:27,980 You're ending up with high shrinkage. 1089 00:49:27,980 --> 00:49:32,690 You have the area where an out of stock is a big issue 1090 00:49:32,690 --> 00:49:34,250 because if somebody walks in there 1091 00:49:34,250 --> 00:49:36,170 and they don't find the title they want, 1092 00:49:36,170 --> 00:49:38,600 they're not going to buy some other title. 1093 00:49:38,600 --> 00:49:40,520 They're going to go to some other store 1094 00:49:40,520 --> 00:49:42,170 with all the money in their pocket, 1095 00:49:42,170 --> 00:49:44,337 and they're going to buy everything else they needed 1096 00:49:44,337 --> 00:49:45,920 at that other store also. 1097 00:49:45,920 --> 00:49:47,930 Or to the consumer products. 1098 00:49:47,930 --> 00:49:53,750 We heard about simply white earlier on here. 1099 00:49:53,750 --> 00:49:58,910 That's another interesting thing for tracking out of stocks. 1100 00:49:58,910 --> 00:50:01,230 And then we have the health care industry, 1101 00:50:01,230 --> 00:50:04,550 where you have to be the huge issue of counterfeits. 1102 00:50:04,550 --> 00:50:07,730 The FDA's basically just come down 1103 00:50:07,730 --> 00:50:16,410 that basically strongly suggests RFID in the packaging there. 1104 00:50:16,410 --> 00:50:18,690 The other area that you're probably 1105 00:50:18,690 --> 00:50:21,600 more familiar with MeadWestvaco, or at least the Mead name, 1106 00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:24,330 is in the consumer and office products area. 1107 00:50:24,330 --> 00:50:28,890 And we're into RFID in that area thanks to Walmart. 1108 00:50:28,890 --> 00:50:34,050 We're at the pallet level in shipping our goods on that, 1109 00:50:34,050 --> 00:50:36,030 in that product line. 1110 00:50:36,030 --> 00:50:40,560 Now, we've been looking at the RFID, 1111 00:50:40,560 --> 00:50:44,980 participating in this area for about six years now. 1112 00:50:44,980 --> 00:50:49,170 We were one of the early members of the auto ID center 1113 00:50:49,170 --> 00:50:50,790 up here at MIT. 1114 00:50:50,790 --> 00:50:53,940 We also founded a group in our company 1115 00:50:53,940 --> 00:50:55,740 called intelligent systems. 1116 00:50:55,740 --> 00:50:59,320 And I'm not sure if any of you had read about them. 1117 00:50:59,320 --> 00:51:04,290 They were in the news for quite some time now here. 1118 00:51:04,290 --> 00:51:10,290 Basically, that group came up with an intelligent shelf 1119 00:51:10,290 --> 00:51:13,410 system where, unlike some of the other ones that 1120 00:51:13,410 --> 00:51:17,280 were out there where people had sent multiple wires to each 1121 00:51:17,280 --> 00:51:20,370 of the antennas trying to reduce the cost, 1122 00:51:20,370 --> 00:51:23,130 we found a way of taking one reader 1123 00:51:23,130 --> 00:51:27,810 and basically using that reader to read 100 antennas 1124 00:51:27,810 --> 00:51:32,820 and having a single wire running down the line of 100 antennas 1125 00:51:32,820 --> 00:51:36,270 and bringing it back. 1126 00:51:36,270 --> 00:51:38,550 This, as you can think about this, 1127 00:51:38,550 --> 00:51:41,190 is a really unique way of reducing 1128 00:51:41,190 --> 00:51:45,190 the cost of the infrastructure by several orders of magnitude. 1129 00:51:45,190 --> 00:51:48,430 And that was essentially our goal here as we got into this. 1130 00:51:48,430 --> 00:51:50,850 We looked at the field and realized 1131 00:51:50,850 --> 00:51:54,150 that for tags to be ubiquitous, the tags 1132 00:51:54,150 --> 00:51:56,520 were going to have to be commodity-type items. 1133 00:51:56,520 --> 00:51:58,290 And there were plenty of players out there 1134 00:51:58,290 --> 00:52:00,840 like Alien-- we were in discussions with them-- who 1135 00:52:00,840 --> 00:52:02,650 were doing a very good job of that. 1136 00:52:02,650 --> 00:52:05,910 But people weren't really addressing the infrastructure 1137 00:52:05,910 --> 00:52:07,390 successfully. 1138 00:52:07,390 --> 00:52:12,930 So now, this last year, we sold the intelligent systems 1139 00:52:12,930 --> 00:52:16,170 or most of the Intelligent systems to an outside group 1140 00:52:16,170 --> 00:52:21,240 so that they could really concentrate on it full force. 1141 00:52:21,240 --> 00:52:23,490 We still have a residual interest 1142 00:52:23,490 --> 00:52:25,350 and are following it because we do 1143 00:52:25,350 --> 00:52:28,020 think that it's very important for success 1144 00:52:28,020 --> 00:52:33,340 in this field for that company to be successful. 1145 00:52:33,340 --> 00:52:35,500 Our capabilities at this point in time, 1146 00:52:35,500 --> 00:52:37,290 we do have production capabilities 1147 00:52:37,290 --> 00:52:42,930 for doing item-level coding of tags, of testing those tags 1148 00:52:42,930 --> 00:52:46,290 in line and tagging boxes. 1149 00:52:46,290 --> 00:52:50,590 We have not seen the pool from the customer base, 1150 00:52:50,590 --> 00:52:52,590 but we're positioned, and we're trying 1151 00:52:52,590 --> 00:52:57,250 to improve that position daily so that we're ready when 1152 00:52:57,250 --> 00:52:59,670 the market pull comes along. 1153 00:52:59,670 --> 00:53:02,040 But basically, our ability to tag 1154 00:53:02,040 --> 00:53:05,280 is anything we can put an EAS tag on today, 1155 00:53:05,280 --> 00:53:09,250 we can switch over and do an RFID tag. 1156 00:53:09,250 --> 00:53:12,815 Now, what we need as far as technology. 1157 00:53:12,815 --> 00:53:14,190 We're looking for the things that 1158 00:53:14,190 --> 00:53:17,640 are going to make our customers successful. 1159 00:53:17,640 --> 00:53:21,690 And probably the primary thing there 1160 00:53:21,690 --> 00:53:25,140 would be item-level tracking at low cost. 1161 00:53:25,140 --> 00:53:29,370 And we've been hearing discussions yesterday and today 1162 00:53:29,370 --> 00:53:32,520 on some of the things that would go into reducing 1163 00:53:32,520 --> 00:53:34,480 the cost of the tag and such. 1164 00:53:34,480 --> 00:53:36,930 But I also want to remind everyone 1165 00:53:36,930 --> 00:53:42,030 that this doesn't necessarily mean 96-bit RFID. 1166 00:53:42,030 --> 00:53:46,080 There's a lot of attention out there to chip lists, tags, 1167 00:53:46,080 --> 00:53:49,470 to organic RFID. 1168 00:53:49,470 --> 00:53:52,650 And these are areas that we're exploring 1169 00:53:52,650 --> 00:53:55,860 and discussions with various companies on. 1170 00:53:55,860 --> 00:53:59,190 But if you were going forward looking into the field, 1171 00:53:59,190 --> 00:54:03,900 one of the things that I want to caution everyone on is that 1172 00:54:03,900 --> 00:54:08,130 these things cannot sit there and expect to come 1173 00:54:08,130 --> 00:54:11,340 in and require a whole new infrastructure through 1174 00:54:11,340 --> 00:54:12,870 the whole supply chain. 1175 00:54:12,870 --> 00:54:16,800 I mean, the 96 bit is a juggernaut 1176 00:54:16,800 --> 00:54:18,720 going down that road there. 1177 00:54:18,720 --> 00:54:22,425 We're going to see that infrastructure go in there. 1178 00:54:22,425 --> 00:54:32,520 Or if the organic RFID can only read at 125 k megahertz 1179 00:54:32,520 --> 00:54:34,530 and you don't have an agile reader that 1180 00:54:34,530 --> 00:54:36,870 can read at both points, you're going 1181 00:54:36,870 --> 00:54:38,560 to have a hard time selling those, 1182 00:54:38,560 --> 00:54:40,890 that organic RFID in there. 1183 00:54:40,890 --> 00:54:44,160 The same with the chipless tags. 1184 00:54:44,160 --> 00:54:46,900 If you've looked at the various chipless technologies, 1185 00:54:46,900 --> 00:54:49,140 it's very interesting, and it's very appealing to us 1186 00:54:49,140 --> 00:54:52,020 because our desire is to be able to just print 1187 00:54:52,020 --> 00:54:53,250 the RFID on there. 1188 00:54:53,250 --> 00:54:55,920 That's the way we're going to reduce the cost down 1189 00:54:55,920 --> 00:54:57,330 for our customers. 1190 00:54:57,330 --> 00:55:01,410 But again, what are you looking at when you get a chipless tag? 1191 00:55:01,410 --> 00:55:04,170 You're probably not looking at 96 bits, 1192 00:55:04,170 --> 00:55:06,930 and you're definitely not looking at the same reader 1193 00:55:06,930 --> 00:55:12,270 that you're using for reading your silicon-based tag. 1194 00:55:12,270 --> 00:55:15,990 Now, there are value propositions out there 1195 00:55:15,990 --> 00:55:20,040 that would draw towards things, these technologies. 1196 00:55:20,040 --> 00:55:25,530 If you can identify the niche market that you're going after, 1197 00:55:25,530 --> 00:55:27,030 we may have something to talk about. 1198 00:55:30,150 --> 00:55:30,820 All right. 1199 00:55:30,820 --> 00:55:33,150 The other thing is we have to look 1200 00:55:33,150 --> 00:55:37,410 at the total cost of the tag over the lifetime. 1201 00:55:37,410 --> 00:55:39,300 It's not just the cost of the chip, 1202 00:55:39,300 --> 00:55:40,810 and I think we've heard that before. 1203 00:55:40,810 --> 00:55:42,090 It's the cost of-- 1204 00:55:42,090 --> 00:55:44,790 how much does it cost to actually put it on the package? 1205 00:55:44,790 --> 00:55:46,150 What's the antenna cost? 1206 00:55:46,150 --> 00:55:49,410 What's the crossover cost there? 1207 00:55:49,410 --> 00:55:52,480 What's going to happen as far as testing. 1208 00:55:52,480 --> 00:55:54,660 How do you handle the rejects when 1209 00:55:54,660 --> 00:55:57,068 you get failed reads in the supply chain? 1210 00:55:57,068 --> 00:55:58,485 How are you going to handle those? 1211 00:55:58,485 --> 00:56:00,510 Those represent costs. 1212 00:56:00,510 --> 00:56:03,960 And then finally, and we've heard that alerted to before, 1213 00:56:03,960 --> 00:56:06,870 this disposal issue is going to come and catch up to us 1214 00:56:06,870 --> 00:56:08,430 at some point in time here. 1215 00:56:08,430 --> 00:56:09,685 What is in your antenna? 1216 00:56:12,240 --> 00:56:13,380 Look at Europe. 1217 00:56:13,380 --> 00:56:15,150 Look at-- there's places in New England 1218 00:56:15,150 --> 00:56:21,390 that are starting to look at the metals and the landfills. 1219 00:56:21,390 --> 00:56:23,190 And then the last area is one that's 1220 00:56:23,190 --> 00:56:25,680 gotten a lot of attention here, and I'm glad to see it, 1221 00:56:25,680 --> 00:56:29,160 and that's in the whole area of track and trace. 1222 00:56:29,160 --> 00:56:33,930 Track and trace is a very, very valuable thing 1223 00:56:33,930 --> 00:56:35,580 to look at, especially when you're 1224 00:56:35,580 --> 00:56:38,370 looking at the pharmaceutical industries. 1225 00:56:38,370 --> 00:56:42,180 But what's going to be out there in the data management 1226 00:56:42,180 --> 00:56:43,535 infrastructure? 1227 00:56:43,535 --> 00:56:44,910 Who's going to come up with that? 1228 00:56:44,910 --> 00:56:47,760 How are we going to handle this data 1229 00:56:47,760 --> 00:56:52,930 asset from various entities in the supply chain? 1230 00:56:52,930 --> 00:56:53,560 That's it. 1231 00:56:53,560 --> 00:56:55,280 I beat John Pierre. 1232 00:56:55,280 --> 00:56:58,710 [APPLAUSE] 1233 00:57:12,748 --> 00:57:15,040 PROFESSOR 1: I guess we're going to run this ourselves, 1234 00:57:15,040 --> 00:57:18,560 so if you have any questions, come on down. 1235 00:57:18,560 --> 00:57:20,750 Sorry, we felt like Miles Davis there with our back 1236 00:57:20,750 --> 00:57:21,830 to the audience. 1237 00:57:21,830 --> 00:57:24,440 But we wanted to learn something new at the same time, 1238 00:57:24,440 --> 00:57:26,360 and it's hard to do it that way. 1239 00:57:26,360 --> 00:57:28,010 So excuse us. 1240 00:57:28,010 --> 00:57:29,110 Yeah. 1241 00:57:29,110 --> 00:57:29,710 AUDIENCE: OK. 1242 00:57:29,710 --> 00:57:31,660 Just one question. 1243 00:57:31,660 --> 00:57:35,710 Again, for what changes are you seeing 1244 00:57:35,710 --> 00:57:41,080 to the metrics as you experiment with this technology 1245 00:57:41,080 --> 00:57:42,542 in your packaging design? 1246 00:57:42,542 --> 00:57:44,500 What do you measure to measure the performance? 1247 00:57:44,500 --> 00:57:45,880 Is that measure changing? 1248 00:57:45,880 --> 00:57:49,180 Units that you measure may be changing. 1249 00:57:49,180 --> 00:57:51,520 What have you experienced with all your testing 1250 00:57:51,520 --> 00:57:55,047 or what you might see in the future? 1251 00:57:55,047 --> 00:57:57,130 PROFESSOR 1: I'm not sure this is the same answer, 1252 00:57:57,130 --> 00:57:59,990 but I don't see much new at all. 1253 00:57:59,990 --> 00:58:05,800 Honestly, units are the same that I used in my graduate work 1254 00:58:05,800 --> 00:58:09,190 studying random vibration as an energy source. 1255 00:58:11,860 --> 00:58:19,750 RF is a great area, and I'm not here to disavow it in any way. 1256 00:58:19,750 --> 00:58:21,910 But it's a technology. 1257 00:58:21,910 --> 00:58:25,090 It's not a panacea. 1258 00:58:25,090 --> 00:58:28,660 With all due deference to previous speakers, 1259 00:58:28,660 --> 00:58:31,480 I don't think it's worthy of a discipline. 1260 00:58:31,480 --> 00:58:36,400 I did get caught short here briefly by asking the gentleman 1261 00:58:36,400 --> 00:58:40,150 from IBM if they still had bar code specialists on staff, 1262 00:58:40,150 --> 00:58:42,700 and he said, yes, we do, although he might not 1263 00:58:42,700 --> 00:58:44,260 have been sure what they did. 1264 00:58:44,260 --> 00:58:46,360 But I know in Michigan, we've gotten rid 1265 00:58:46,360 --> 00:58:48,610 of bar code specialists. 1266 00:58:48,610 --> 00:58:52,570 And one of my students is working with Simon Langford 1267 00:58:52,570 --> 00:58:54,310 at Walmart running their lab. 1268 00:58:54,310 --> 00:58:58,240 And when he was hired, the comment Simon made 1269 00:58:58,240 --> 00:59:00,340 was that we hope in three years you don't 1270 00:59:00,340 --> 00:59:03,820 have a job because the intent was to make this 1271 00:59:03,820 --> 00:59:06,820 so broadly based across the company that it becomes 1272 00:59:06,820 --> 00:59:11,060 as common as UPC, and you don't need anything special. 1273 00:59:11,060 --> 00:59:15,067 It's just an adaptive technology that helps. 1274 00:59:15,067 --> 00:59:15,900 AUDIENCE: Thank you. 1275 00:59:20,238 --> 00:59:21,780 AUDIENCE: Hi, I'm Patrick [INAUDIBLE] 1276 00:59:21,780 --> 00:59:22,945 from Georgetown University. 1277 00:59:22,945 --> 00:59:25,320 And I want to thank you guys first for this presentation. 1278 00:59:25,320 --> 00:59:28,890 I think it outlined a lot of the shortcomings 1279 00:59:28,890 --> 00:59:31,380 in this technology set in on-- 1280 00:59:31,380 --> 00:59:32,700 PROFESSOR 1: Opportunities. 1281 00:59:32,700 --> 00:59:33,600 AUDIENCE: Opportunities, yes. 1282 00:59:33,600 --> 00:59:34,140 Absolutely. 1283 00:59:34,140 --> 00:59:36,900 And I've sat in on several government meetings 1284 00:59:36,900 --> 00:59:40,890 on launching RFID for identity management. 1285 00:59:40,890 --> 00:59:43,050 And the shortcomings that I'm seeing time and time 1286 00:59:43,050 --> 00:59:45,113 again are the lack of understanding from, 1287 00:59:45,113 --> 00:59:47,280 and I don't want to name names, but these consulting 1288 00:59:47,280 --> 00:59:49,560 companies that kind of promise RFID in a box 1289 00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:51,690 and passive allowing you to drive through 1290 00:59:51,690 --> 00:59:53,400 at 55 miles an hour and things like that. 1291 00:59:53,400 --> 00:59:55,002 And it's just not being answered. 1292 00:59:55,002 --> 00:59:56,460 So I think research like this would 1293 00:59:56,460 --> 00:59:59,040 be very advantageous to be out there 1294 00:59:59,040 --> 01:00:00,600 in the public for the industry. 1295 01:00:00,600 --> 01:00:04,080 My question is on pharmaceutical. 1296 01:00:04,080 --> 01:00:08,070 The FDA has asked to secure around counterfeiting 1297 01:00:08,070 --> 01:00:10,718 that there's over, covert, and forensic. 1298 01:00:10,718 --> 01:00:12,510 And in the launches that are out there now, 1299 01:00:12,510 --> 01:00:13,860 you're seeing overt and covert. 1300 01:00:13,860 --> 01:00:15,950 You're not seeing forensic. 1301 01:00:15,950 --> 01:00:18,760 And I'm curious if anyone can answer that. 1302 01:00:18,760 --> 01:00:21,510 And then my last as a potential wag of the finger. 1303 01:00:21,510 --> 01:00:24,540 I hope none of you are responsible for those damn huge 1304 01:00:24,540 --> 01:00:28,080 plastic containers for my small microchip that 1305 01:00:28,080 --> 01:00:30,420 are frustratingly impossible to open. 1306 01:00:30,420 --> 01:00:33,270 So thanks again. 1307 01:00:33,270 --> 01:00:35,362 [INTERPOSING VOICES] 1308 01:00:42,522 --> 01:00:44,480 PROFESSOR 1: I don't have a really good answer, 1309 01:00:44,480 --> 01:00:48,410 I guess, on the forensic. 1310 01:00:48,410 --> 01:00:51,350 We have done work with both overt and covert, 1311 01:00:51,350 --> 01:00:55,880 and there are much better experts than at least the three 1312 01:00:55,880 --> 01:00:56,578 of us on that. 1313 01:00:56,578 --> 01:00:57,620 It's kind of interesting. 1314 01:00:57,620 --> 01:01:01,160 If you guys pull out $100 bill and just pass them forward, 1315 01:01:01,160 --> 01:01:03,530 I'll show you how they have all of these security 1316 01:01:03,530 --> 01:01:06,410 or anti-counterfeiting techniques involved. 1317 01:01:06,410 --> 01:01:09,710 And for those of you visiting from different countries, 1318 01:01:09,710 --> 01:01:17,420 our currency now has 20 overt or covert anti-counterfeiting 1319 01:01:17,420 --> 01:01:20,840 detection devices built into it and at least 10 others 1320 01:01:20,840 --> 01:01:23,060 that they won't talk about. 1321 01:01:23,060 --> 01:01:25,850 But there's roughly 30 anti-counterfeiting features 1322 01:01:25,850 --> 01:01:27,830 in an individual bill. 1323 01:01:27,830 --> 01:01:29,570 And those are the people you really 1324 01:01:29,570 --> 01:01:31,910 need to bring into this discussion 1325 01:01:31,910 --> 01:01:34,130 because I'm certainly not a specialist in that. 1326 01:01:34,130 --> 01:01:35,088 PROFESSOR 3: All right. 1327 01:01:35,088 --> 01:01:36,260 Well, I'll answer that. 1328 01:01:36,260 --> 01:01:38,270 I'd like to answer that. 1329 01:01:38,270 --> 01:01:39,670 We're on it. 1330 01:01:39,670 --> 01:01:42,240 We can't tell you what we're doing, but we're on it, 1331 01:01:42,240 --> 01:01:45,350 and we have those three areas covered. 1332 01:01:45,350 --> 01:01:46,350 PROFESSOR 2: Very quick. 1333 01:01:46,350 --> 01:01:48,990 And also, on the area that we never discuss 1334 01:01:48,990 --> 01:01:50,640 is temporary evidence. 1335 01:01:50,640 --> 01:01:54,320 And have you seen something of plastic? 1336 01:01:54,320 --> 01:01:56,870 It said if it's not there, don't use it. 1337 01:01:56,870 --> 01:01:59,390 But if it's out there, you cannot read it anymore. 1338 01:01:59,390 --> 01:02:03,960 And so we're discussing, and the best protection for [INAUDIBLE] 1339 01:02:03,960 --> 01:02:05,540 is that nobody can see it. 1340 01:02:05,540 --> 01:02:08,307 And this is what we're working on. 1341 01:02:08,307 --> 01:02:09,140 AUDIENCE: Thank you. 1342 01:02:09,140 --> 01:02:10,050 Good presentation. 1343 01:02:10,050 --> 01:02:10,760 PROFESSOR 1: Thank you. 1344 01:02:10,760 --> 01:02:12,385 AUDIENCE: Yeah, John Helford from Mars. 1345 01:02:12,385 --> 01:02:14,540 My question is, how is RFID starting 1346 01:02:14,540 --> 01:02:16,582 to work its way into the curriculum, particularly 1347 01:02:16,582 --> 01:02:18,790 undergraduate, because it's important that they know? 1348 01:02:18,790 --> 01:02:20,660 And also, how are you training the guys that 1349 01:02:20,660 --> 01:02:23,390 aren't in school anymore about the utilization of technology 1350 01:02:23,390 --> 01:02:24,332 in a supplier base? 1351 01:02:24,332 --> 01:02:25,790 I'd be interested in that question. 1352 01:02:28,390 --> 01:02:31,660 PROFESSOR 1: From a Michigan State standpoint, at least, 1353 01:02:31,660 --> 01:02:33,820 I started teaching a class on RFID 1354 01:02:33,820 --> 01:02:35,590 and packaging two years ago. 1355 01:02:35,590 --> 01:02:39,130 And it's been an elective class, but I've 1356 01:02:39,130 --> 01:02:42,430 had really good turnouts not only from packaging 1357 01:02:42,430 --> 01:02:46,510 but from engineering, from supply chain 1358 01:02:46,510 --> 01:02:50,320 management, logistics, because all of these cross over, 1359 01:02:50,320 --> 01:02:51,310 these areas. 1360 01:02:51,310 --> 01:02:56,170 And we now have companies coming in 1361 01:02:56,170 --> 01:03:00,100 to hire our undergraduates and even our graduate students that 1362 01:03:00,100 --> 01:03:02,320 will not even interview them if they haven't had 1363 01:03:02,320 --> 01:03:07,228 the class because this is an area that companies are trying 1364 01:03:07,228 --> 01:03:09,520 to find those answers and they're trying to find people 1365 01:03:09,520 --> 01:03:14,380 that have hands-on work and feel so that they come in hitting 1366 01:03:14,380 --> 01:03:19,120 the ground running, as opposed to having to be trained. 1367 01:03:19,120 --> 01:03:21,730 They're also, just like yourself, 1368 01:03:21,730 --> 01:03:23,950 conferences up the wazoo. 1369 01:03:23,950 --> 01:03:26,170 You know, JP and I've talked repeatedly 1370 01:03:26,170 --> 01:03:28,810 about we could be at a conference every week 1371 01:03:28,810 --> 01:03:29,720 of the year. 1372 01:03:29,720 --> 01:03:33,610 And if you could get more of them in Hawaii, we might. 1373 01:03:33,610 --> 01:03:36,640 But that's really what you're almost limited to. 1374 01:03:36,640 --> 01:03:41,650 But we are developing an online, web-based program 1375 01:03:41,650 --> 01:03:46,550 for recent graduates like yourself. 1376 01:03:46,550 --> 01:03:47,800 PROFESSOR 2: Yeah, very quick. 1377 01:03:47,800 --> 01:03:50,890 And [INAUDIBLE] our packaging science program. 1378 01:03:50,890 --> 01:03:54,950 Almost every course is where you can have RFID, a topic in it 1379 01:03:54,950 --> 01:03:56,030 is already there. 1380 01:03:56,030 --> 01:03:58,660 So we have a chapter in transportation, distribution, 1381 01:03:58,660 --> 01:03:59,920 food packaging. 1382 01:03:59,920 --> 01:04:03,040 We have customer product. 1383 01:04:03,040 --> 01:04:05,530 All these packaging courses, they all 1384 01:04:05,530 --> 01:04:10,340 have chapter where it's suitable to put it inside. 1385 01:04:10,340 --> 01:04:12,290 PROFESSOR 3: And well, basically, we've 1386 01:04:12,290 --> 01:04:14,660 been talking to our senior management about it 1387 01:04:14,660 --> 01:04:17,120 for probably six years now. 1388 01:04:17,120 --> 01:04:21,290 And I think they get it now. 1389 01:04:21,290 --> 01:04:23,990 We're way past the early days when 1390 01:04:23,990 --> 01:04:28,070 people thought RFID meant you'd read them from satellites. 1391 01:04:28,070 --> 01:04:31,700 I think if you cornered anyone in our senior management team, 1392 01:04:31,700 --> 01:04:35,950 you'd have a pretty good conversation. 1393 01:04:35,950 --> 01:04:37,148 PROFESSOR 1: Last question. 1394 01:04:37,148 --> 01:04:37,690 AUDIENCE: Hi. 1395 01:04:37,690 --> 01:04:42,860 My name is [INAUDIBLE] from Gillette P&G. 1396 01:04:42,860 --> 01:04:45,740 As part of EPCglobal, there's a strong effort 1397 01:04:45,740 --> 01:04:48,680 to try and standardize on measures and metrics 1398 01:04:48,680 --> 01:04:50,580 and, like you mentioned, John [INAUDIBLE] 1399 01:04:50,580 --> 01:04:54,380 and both Jeff [INAUDIBLE] are co-chairs. 1400 01:04:54,380 --> 01:04:56,600 I'm the third co-chair of that group. 1401 01:04:56,600 --> 01:05:00,365 We'd like to get more academic involvement into that group. 1402 01:05:00,365 --> 01:05:02,240 How do we make that happen so that you're not 1403 01:05:02,240 --> 01:05:05,850 going off and doing these tests that are very interesting, 1404 01:05:05,850 --> 01:05:08,270 but if we can try and synergize on those? 1405 01:05:08,270 --> 01:05:10,148 I'd like to hear your thoughts on that. 1406 01:05:10,148 --> 01:05:11,190 PROFESSOR 1: Great issue. 1407 01:05:11,190 --> 01:05:13,580 I actually had a conversation with some people 1408 01:05:13,580 --> 01:05:18,182 from EPCglobal yesterday to try and synthesize 1409 01:05:18,182 --> 01:05:19,390 some of the work we're doing. 1410 01:05:19,390 --> 01:05:24,440 I'm a co-chair-- actually, a chair 1411 01:05:24,440 --> 01:05:28,250 of a new task group within ASTM, the American Society 1412 01:05:28,250 --> 01:05:34,160 of Testing Materials, where we are developing procedures 1413 01:05:34,160 --> 01:05:38,150 and reporting on how you test. 1414 01:05:38,150 --> 01:05:42,200 Case loads, pallet loads, military applications, 1415 01:05:42,200 --> 01:05:45,110 pharmaceutical applications, et cetera. 1416 01:05:45,110 --> 01:05:48,260 We want to work in conjunction with you on developing these 1417 01:05:48,260 --> 01:05:50,420 and share all the data. 1418 01:05:50,420 --> 01:05:53,690 Where we're different from EPC, because it always comes up, 1419 01:05:53,690 --> 01:05:59,120 is that we are reader tag frequency agnostic. 1420 01:05:59,120 --> 01:06:01,340 We don't care what you use. 1421 01:06:01,340 --> 01:06:04,970 Here is a standard procedure for measuring 1422 01:06:04,970 --> 01:06:08,930 readability of a case, readability of an item. 1423 01:06:08,930 --> 01:06:11,240 Read distance, read fields. 1424 01:06:11,240 --> 01:06:12,390 Military. 1425 01:06:12,390 --> 01:06:14,370 Whatever it is. 1426 01:06:14,370 --> 01:06:18,920 And so if it fits into EPC through 13.56, 9.15, 1427 01:06:18,920 --> 01:06:20,360 they might be identical. 1428 01:06:20,360 --> 01:06:22,040 But if you have a closed loop system 1429 01:06:22,040 --> 01:06:24,920 and are looking at that 134 or 2.4, 1430 01:06:24,920 --> 01:06:28,790 5.8, and even different frequencies from that-- 1431 01:06:28,790 --> 01:06:30,800 there's so much in military at 4.33 1432 01:06:30,800 --> 01:06:35,150 right now that we just want to set up what that is. 1433 01:06:35,150 --> 01:06:39,350 And if anybody contacts me, I'll be happy to respond. 1434 01:06:39,350 --> 01:06:43,340 PROFESSOR 2: Maybe I can do something about it, about EPC 1435 01:06:43,340 --> 01:06:46,440 and the standardization. 1436 01:06:46,440 --> 01:06:49,580 I would say that in our lab, we touch many, many areas. 1437 01:06:49,580 --> 01:06:52,460 Some of them will fall under EPC what you're looking for, 1438 01:06:52,460 --> 01:06:54,320 and that's going to be good. 1439 01:06:54,320 --> 01:06:57,440 But we still are going to keep doing other areas 1440 01:06:57,440 --> 01:07:01,380 because the request of other applications is pretty big. 1441 01:07:01,380 --> 01:07:03,590 And so if some of the things that we do 1442 01:07:03,590 --> 01:07:06,560 will fall under EPC what are you looking for, this is great, OK? 1443 01:07:06,560 --> 01:07:08,720 But we still going to have a lot of things 1444 01:07:08,720 --> 01:07:12,220 that we want to keep running also. 1445 01:07:12,220 --> 01:07:12,790 Thank you. 1446 01:07:12,790 --> 01:07:13,330 [INAUDIBLE] 1447 01:07:13,330 --> 01:07:16,080 [APPLAUSE]