Day Two at NRF with Craig Keefner

Craig Keefner is publisher of Kiosks.org. He's covering the National Retail Federation's Big Show in New York.

NEW YORK -- I had a busy day at NRF on Monday.

I started out the day with Scott Medford of Intermec Technologies Corp., and it was very good. Medford (vice president, global alliance business development) is the main guy I spoke with and he had a lot of good insights.

Craig Keefner, Publisher, Kiosks.org Association

We looked at the wireless mobile platform with handhelds doing barcode scanning and price checks (more than 10,000 installed at Home Depots) and it was a very nice platform. The power duration was of concern to me, so I asked. And the answer I got was that the battery packs for the mobile platform last anywhere from 24 to 48 hours. Power conversion is done on the platform and regular printers are powered and accessed normally via parallel ports via the wireless mobile platform.

The wireless device does scans, prints signage and store shelf labels, and accommodates all types of printers. Everything piggybacks on the roll-around platform.

Medford said Intermec is working with financial institutions (including Fifth Third Bank) on wireless secure verification and real-time transfer on card transactions.

I learned another interesting fact during my visit. About seven years ago Intermec bought all of the RFID (radio frequency identification) patents and technology from IBM. Intermec chairs most of the committees and is working toward standards-based RFID. Intermec, based in Everett, Wash., and a UNOVA Inc. (NYSE: UNA) company, also bought a company which owned technology for turnpikes (road travel).

The buzz is: RFID tags

In retail, the buzz is about really cheap RFID tags. The amount of data is massive and the approach Intermec is taking, with chips for pallets, means you can track movements of inventory all over the world. The next step is containers and cartons. The next step after that is discrete items. Systems are not yet ready for that amount of data. Intermec is working with IBM and EDS (its primary partners) trying to adapt existing applications in the field to accommodate that data stream.

Imagine a consumer loading up a cart, strolling through a checkout and getting a receipt on the way out. Lane Busters. A retailer's nirvana. Big stuff. . . Another primary partner is Sensormatic, a division of Tyco based in Boca Raton, Fla.,  a security-oriented firm. Assets and products are not only tracked but they have a history. It's a little like that book George on "Seinfeld" took into the bathroom.

The other side of the equation for Intermec is its linear scan engines, as opposed to the laser versions (by Symbol Technologies). Reading damaged bar codes, bar codes on laminate surfaces, and even on computer screens [TFTs (thin film transistor), etc.] is something linear imaging brings to the table.

Is RFID going to be big this year? According to Medford, it is going to be a huge area (and all I heard echoed that sentiment). The strength of Intermec in that area is that the company chairs the ISO and IEEE committees and is committed to standards rather than ad hoc changes.

A very interesting note here is GTIN (global trade item number). That relates to the UCC code which in the U.S. is currently 12 digits long and is changing to 14 digits (which will match European standards). That change has to be in place by 2005. Imagine the changes to the databases to accommodate the extra digits. Intermec scanner engines accommodate that new change and can pass the new 14-digit and the legacy code. Just so you understand, we are talking about beer and chips and all that good stuff. Major changes.

2005 came up again when I stopped by Magtek and talked to Pat Oven. By 2005, in the UK, all retailers have to accept chip based cards. Today they are looking at a hypercard (basically a magstripe) reader that works with older and newer smartcards. Options include a fairly expensive motorized card reader that reads a chip and/or a magstripe. Working with Dionco Inc. and Wincor Nixdorf on behalf of Tesco (great UK grocery store!), Magtek came up with a less expensive, more effective solution. Already, 26,000 of these devices have now been contracted by Tesco to upgrade its POS. It's called Swipe and Park. With a single swipe, the card is locked in place and the chip is read. Hybrid readers that are fairly inexpensive is the end result.

Very, very cool!

It's a Wrap

To wrap: RFID, customers and cost are the big themes I see. The impact that vendors such as retail software providers Retek and Triversity are making in the merchandising back-ends is notable. A tremendous demo in the Intel/Cisco/Ernst & Young customer area with the EZ-Order was stunning in its graphics. Having worked with SGI for years, I was flabbergasted. They did not allow me to take any pictures (the demo was a burger-and-fries ordering workstation with language options). A fantastic demo by Wincor Nixdorf with their Beetle (which runs all and any operating systems) had multiple other vendor displays, cash drawers and printers. Great stuff! And the German engineering with the Intel motherboards was extremely notable.

The night was capped off with an invite to Tavern on the Green and the IBM Preferred Customer Party. I met up with Francie Mendelsohn and ended up running into Michael Kachmar of Kiosk Business, Ed Crowley of Fivepoint, and Alex Richardson of Netkey Inc. Big thanks to Cort Johnson of IBM for inviting us.