Date: September 2, 2004

Presenter: Mark Ancona, President

Affiliation: Dataflo Consulting - Dataflo Consulting website

The guest speaker for this meeting was Mark Ancona, newly appointed President of Dataflo Consulting - Dataflo Consulting Website. Mr. Ancona discussed "RFID Technology: Current and Future Applications."

Dataflo Consulting integrates data collection technology into Legacy Systems with various strategies, tools and skill sets. They are one of very few fully RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) Certified integration experts in all facets of an RFID deployment. If a client has special needs, they have developed Thinkware as a strategic method of establishing processes for a specific project or software development system.

RFID is rapidly gaining traction in the supply chain execution vertical. Propelled by recent mandates by Wal-Mart as well as the US Department of Defence (D.O.D.), RFID is expected to grow at a significant rate for the next 8-10 years. Dataflo specializes in the 13.56 MHz (High frequency) and the 915 MHz (Ultra-High Frequency) RFID systems. The latter, 915 MHz is also known as the "EPC" (Electronic Product Code) tag, and is the technology now mandated for use in shipments to the US Department of Defense, Wal-Mart, Target and many other retailers.

There are other areas of RFID technology, for example passive or active, that allow for the specialization. Passive RFID tags, such as a building access card, operate without a separate external power source and obtain operating power generated from the reader. Active RFID tags are powered by an internal battery and are typically read/write. The ability to store variable information on a "tag" creates a history of mobile data.