29-09-2022
Over the years posts have invested in RFID technology, and IPC has developed several services based on this technology, which provides added value to posts in terms of Quality of Service, Tracking and Asset management. To explain the benefits and possibilities for postal users of these RFID-based services, IPC’s RFID Services team has tried several approaches with flowcharts, process maps, pictures, onsite visits and drawings. But during the summer of 2022, the RFID Services team developed a new and unique method of demoing the benefits of RFID-based services using a miniature physical demo setup with Lego blocks simulating postal operations and thus demonstrating the opportunities of the RFID data in real time.
An image can make more of an impact than a thousand words, so seeing the process and having the capability to touch and move parts of the building blocks of RFID-based services ensures everybody is engaged with the process. This demo allows non-RFID experts to fully grasp the potential of RFID technology for tracking services and other RFID-based solutions like asset management or fleet management. Demo participants can experience the added value and flexibility of the RFID-based services at IPC, viewing a miniature postal pipeline with five clear scenes: an e-seller warehouse, a post office/sorting center, an outbound Office of Exchange or ISC, an inbound Office of Exchange or ISC and a delivery office/parcel locker. Well-selected pictures and scenery of colourful Lego cubes make it very tangible and clear how the service works and what these services can offer for a participating post in terms of enriched RFID data.Behind the colourful Lego cubes and pictures, the construction hides a set of 5 short-range RFID readers and antenna’s capturing and registering the movements of tags attached to specific Lego objects, like a Sprinter van, Pallet Boxes, postal bags and e-commerce packets. Just like in the real postal pipeline, moving these Lego objects throughout the scenes (i.e. making them go from one postal facility to another as part of their trip in the postal flow) results in a set of events, logs and reads on a monitoring screen demonstrating how the data can be used for tracking postal objects, asset management or registration of presence. Using this very visual and hands-on approach, the demo display creates an immediate understanding how movement of postal objects, connected to RFID technology results in data which brings added value for their organisation.
The RFID Services team presented this demo display for the first time to the RFID experts participating in the RFID Receptacle Tracking User Group which met on Tuesday 27 September 2022; the team demo-ed the RFID Item Tracking, RFID Receptacle Tracking, Sprinter solution and Pallet Box stock management during a 20-minute demonstration. The reactions from the RFID experts were very positive. They stated that such a demo display will surely bring a better understanding of how RFID services work and what they can bring in terms of added value to the posts interested in participating in the RFID-based services.
Postal staff visiting IPC and interested to see the RFID Services demo can always contact the RFID services team ([email protected]).