MIT plans the next leap for ADC
Development of electro-magnetic identification technology is already in full swing.
By Staff -- ADC News and Solutions, 1/1/2000
Today's supply chain is a network of weak links and these links will always be weak as long as there are human beings involved."With that statement, Kevin Ashton, co-director of the Auto-ID Center at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) raised a lot of attention from attendees at last month's Automatic Identification Manufacturer's (AIM) annual meeting.
He and others at MIT are planning on taking automatic data capture (ADC) technology closer to that place we've all dreamed about-where a move in the physical world automatically generates data. It is a system in which the only human beings involved in the supply chain are the person ordering the item, and whoever delivers the item to your front door.
"This is the world we're going to create," says Ashton. "This is a big, big deal."
And according to Ashton, it's going to happen within three to five years-when appliances in the average home are all connected to the Internet.
The Center expects to drive a "global revolution" in the way goods are made, distributed, and sold. The technology it expects to play a major role in this is electro-magnetic identification (EMID), which will uniquely identify every consumable product made.
Electro-magnetic technologies use electro-magnetic waves that transmit identity information without wires. Electro-magnetic waves include light, radio, and magnetic pulses.
MIT is the institution that will make this technology a reality with the Auto-ID Center, says Ashton. Governed by a board of overseers, the center will be made up of 20 sponsors from around the world, representing industries including consumer goods, retail, food, and transportation.
The Center's mission is to create an "Internet of things." This new Internet will merge the old "network of atoms" (production, distribution, sale, use, and disposal of products) with the "network of bits" also known as the Internet. The Auto-ID center is funded by Proctor & Gamble, Gillette, the Uniform Code Council, and MIT.
More information on this innovative technology will become available when the Auto-ID Center's web page goes live this month. The web site can be accessed at http://auto-id.mit.edu. Additionally, a Smart World Conference is slated for April 12-13, 2000 at MIT. The Conference will focus on EMID.
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