The contemporary world is in the ultra-modern era, as far as science and technology go. Human civilization is heading towards a more sophisticated and advanced lifestyle, making life easy, constructive, progressive, and meaningful. Gone are the days of GPS and other tracking systems. They have limitations, drawbacks, and hence they are outdated today.
The present-day tracking system evolves around RFID solutions (Radio Frequency Identification solutions). It generates faster data accuracy and significantly reduces labor costs. Know all about RFID, its applications, and its advantages, especially while choosing a specialist company to implement tracking for vehicle fleets.
RFID And Its Relevance
The overall objective of tracking vehicle fleets is to manage the asset information of the entire fleet. It improves the quality, accuracy, and efficiency of your operations. It also drastically reduces costs and ensures compliance throughout your services. Fleet management involves several activities like:
- Vehicle financing or leasing.
- Compliance and licenses.
- Vehicle management.
- Management of supply chain.
- Diagnosis and monitoring.
- Management of accidents.
- Diver, speed, and fuel management.
- Safety and health management, etc.
Effective and accurate tracking is inevitable for fleet management leading to business progress. RFID technology offers advanced mechanisms that ensure data accuracy resulting inappropriate and perfect fleet management.
The traditional tracking system that uses papers like licenses and other certifications, stickers attached in different places of the vehicle, barcode, and camera are ineffective and outdated. On the other hand, with the implementation of an RFID tracking system, you get reliable support in the following areas:
- Automatic scanning.
- Automatic data logging.
- RFID Tags can hold multiple unique codes, and they can read plurally.
- You can label each item separately and individually.
- Higher security, especially on product authentication. No counterfeit in comparison to the barcode.
- Since every tag is unique, you can locate and find lost or stolen inventory without much difficulty.
What To Know While Choosing An RFID Specialised Company?
RFID technology is the technology of choice throughout the world for tracking vehicle fleets and numerous other purposes. RFID readers can read a variety of tags for which they are used in many sectors like education, medical, retail, manufacturing, etc.
They read the tags from a specific distance, access and record the history, and keep the product safe. However, before jumping on implementing the technology straight away, you need to know or be acquainted with the basic components or mechanisms of RFID. They are -the antenna or coil, the transceiver with decoder, and the RF tag or the transponder.
- Coil Or Antenna: The antenna starts with the tracking by emitting a radio signal. It ultimately activates the tag, including the RFID printers and other RFID mechanisms. Antenna plays a key role between the tag and decoder that are responsible for data recording and other communications. There are several types, sizes, shapes, and capacities of antennas. Antennas are fixed at various passages and places where they produce electromagnetic fields to record data.
- Transponder Or Tags: This is a microchip that identifies the information produced by the antenna and transmits the information to the tag for encoding. Exactly like different spectra or frequencies in various wireless systems, the RFID tags come with different capacities of spectra of tags. Similarly, the storage capacity of transponders differs depending upon the requirement of the job. It starts with a minimum of 16 bits and can grow up to a few thousand as per the RFID asset tracking need. However, the more you pay the more is the storage capacity.
- Rfid Reader Or Interrogator: This is a device that communicates with the tag and emits radio waves through a different antenna to receive the signals from the tag. This device is often called the Interrogator because it interacts with or interrogates the tag. In the process, once the data is retrieved from the antenna to the RFID reader, the interrogator emits radio waves and activates the microchip, and transmits the data. This is how the technology captures, records, and tracks the entire RFID inventory management system.
What To Do While Choosing A Specialist RFID Service Provider?
Choosing the right service provider not only for RFID service but for all types of services, in general, is a daunting task. You need to look for all details, ask and search all nooks and corners of their services, limitations, and challenges, and above all prices or service charges. You need to essentially do this so that you do not face any trouble once you have incorporated them into your business. If you are looking for the best RFID specialists near you, here are a few things you should do before finalising one of them for your purpose.
- Check the brand, its reputation, and the license before you start with the interaction. A company that genuinely provides good RFID services and products must have a reputation. You can check their license from their official site.
- Check the tags offered by the service provider. A good company should have a variety of tags like passive tags, active tags, etc. You should also check the size, sensor requirement, weight, application, etc. of the tags as they affect their performance. Remember, environmental conditions affect the tags. So, make sure the tags you choose should match the environment of your business.
- Read the reviews of the RFID company before you fix the appointment for interaction. You might find out many things- both positive and negative from the customers who have taken assistance from the company.
- Do your homework and plan appropriately based on your exact needs. You can read a journal and attend trade shows, industry events, and RFID solution centres. You can also involve your team or set up a selection team if you have a team of employees.
Once fully prepared with your need assessment and planning, you can meet and interact with the vendor and start negotiating. Never forget to meet as many professionals as possible in the company. Try to dig deeper into every detail of the RFID technology, its products, and its services. It will eventually ensure the right specialist RFID company for your purpose, which might last for a long time without any trouble.
