A new methodological framework to implement an RFID project and its application

The introduction of new technologies in the industrial field has consistently seen the development of several different projects: some have been carried out successfully and others have encountered many difficulties, resulting in the failure of the projects. Often this is caused by the lack of the correct methodology to tackle the project and to understand how the new technology could be used in industrial applications. At present, radio frequency identification (RFID) technology represents a new tool of support for the automation of the processes and the improvement of the operating management of a system, being the missing link between the material flow and the information flow. RFID technology is used in a large number of possible applications, like product tracking, animal identification, inventory systems and others. However, in recent years, an inconsistent increase of such applications has been observed, due to the diverse information available on such technology and to the lack of a support methodology for this technology in the project management. For these reasons and above all due to the lack of methodological project supporting tools, many projects fail or are not implemented. After a brief introduction about RFID technology, this paper analyses the scientific contributions and the recent industrial applications of this new technology. Soon after, a new methodological framework is introduced in order to face the feasibility study for the application of RFID technology (born from the authors’ experience in the field), illustrating some pilot cases that have exceeded today the experimentation phase.