Now that Wal-Mart plans to ask its top 100 suppliers to have radio frequency identification tags on pallets and cartons by January 1, 2005, the race is on to develop radio frequency identification (RFID) solutions for the supply chain.

While no one can predict the future, "we are moving toward an Internet of things," according to John Pulling, COO of Provia Software. "That's an automated supply chain, where everything can identify itself."

Pulling described how Provia is working with Gillette and the Auto-ID Center at MIT to develop an RFID solution for the supply chain at the software provider's user's conference.

In the Internet of things, products will be assigned an electronic product code, or EPC, that includes a serial number, product identification information and the identity of the company. When an RFID tag is read, that information will be forwarded to a middle layer of software that will decode the EPCs. That information goes to an "object name server," or ONS, that tracks products.

Every product will have a PML, or physical markup language, associated with it. The PML is like a web address for every product. Information from the ONS will be used to update the PML every time a product tag is read. That information will be sent to whatever application is requesting information about a product.

Although an automated supply chain like the one described above is still years away, Pulling said that early adopters like Wal-Mart will use information from the EPC to automate and speed up operations done with bar codes today.