On 15 October 2004, the Electronics Division organized a technical seminar on "Linking the Virtual Logistics Supply Chains". The speakers, Anna Lin \ Chief Executive, and Adrian Chan \ Program Manager of EPC Global gave a talk on the latest development on the RFID technology and its applications.
Anna Lin, our honorable guest, opened the talk by providing an overview to RFID technology. She elaborated RFID as a mature technology that is invented some 50 years ago, and had been used for the military applications during World War 2. The technology is quite expensive for commercial development, but in Hong Kong , there have been two applications, namely, AutoToll and Octopus that run quite successfully. Anna went on to explain about the Electronics Product Code (EPC), which is a standard aimed at the whole concept of RFID application on the supply chain and sharing information across the EPC network. Proposed in 1999 by MIT Auto-ID Lab, EPC received support from over 100 MNCs, universities. Anna further elaborated the benefits of the EPC to the supply chain, especially in the reduction of inventory, detection of counterfeit, and improvement to labor efficiency. To the consumer, the benefit will be product availability, no-scan check out, and interactive shopping. Mr. Adrian Chan continued the talk in presenting the technical aspects of the EPC. EPC in a nuts shell, and different technical building blocks, such as RFID taps, EPC system in middleware, backbone, and various EPC standard specifications were discussed. The seminar ended with a question-and-answer session. Souvenir was presented by the chairman of the technical talk, Ir Jolly Wong, to express our sincere thanks to the speakers in giving us such informative and great talks.
|