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ABSTRACT
In today's fast-changing competition environment, companies and organizations need to renew their services and products, and change and replace their business processes with new ones continuously to benefit more from time and resources. Therefore, data capturing, gathering and management technologies are always needed by companies and organizations to support their decision-making and plans, and develop their strategies. One of the technologies that could help companies to handle data is RFID (Radio Frequency Identification). Many organizations are slow in warming up to the idea of using RFID to conduct more effective and efficient business processes, data mining applications, and cost savings. In this study, RFID technology and its system structure are proposed. The paper introduces a middleware for business models including RFID technology. Information about the advantages of RFID over today's data gathering and Auto-ID (Automatic Identification) technologies is given. The impacts of RFID technology on business systems, especially supply chain management, are presented.
Keywords: Radio Frequency Identification; Data Gathering; Item Tracking/monitoring; Process Management; Supply Chain Management
Introduction
Technological innovations and their consequences are becoming indispensable parts of our daily lives. RFID, as one of these innovations, is a system that provides easy, secure and quick data entry, storage and transmission. It is used in many places such as shops, stores, hospitals, pharmaceuticals companies, logistic services etc. where real time data should be used (Brown, 2007, Miles et al., 2008). At its core, RFID is an enabling technology that has the potential to help retailers provide the right product at the right place at the right time, thus maximizing sales and profits. It builds a basis for coding, storage and transmission systems. It improves the data management capabilities and resolves the problems caused by lack of information. It provides contactless and wireless technology to identify objects that are uniquely manufactured, shipped and sold, such as container, pallet, case and item, thus it provides the building blocks for increased visibility throughout the supply chain. It is important in improving efficiency and visibility, cutting costs, delivering better asset utilization, producing higher quality goods, reducing shrinkage and counterfeiting, and increasing sales by reducing out-of-stocks (Angeles, 2005, Brazeal, 2009). It helps in gathering data and improves the security of information about the objects. RFID has vast applications...