EU supports RFID research program

A three year initiative dedicated to research, development, training and demonstration in the effective use of RFID based on EPCglobal standards, has been launched in Brussels. The Building Radio frequency IDentification solutions for the Global Environment (BRIDGE) project is being supported by the European Union’s Sixth Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development (FP6) with €7,5 million funding.

Coordinated by global data standards body, GS1, the BRIDGE project brings together a consortium of 31 global organizations. Participants in the program comprise universities in Europe and China, including three of the Auto-ID Labs, solutions providers, both large and small, together with large scale retailers, manufacturers and SMEs.

‘Since its inception, RFID has been hailed as the panacea for a more sophisticated and efficient global supply chain, but there are many questions to answer before this is realized,' said Henri Barthel, technical director at EPCglobal and BRIDGE project Co-ordinator. 'Cross-industry participation in such a large scale project is a key to its success. The BRIDGE project will transform RFID from being an identification technology into providing an EPCglobal based product information network.'

The BRIDGE project will focus on business-based research, provision of information services and hardware (sensors, tags) and software development.

This will lead to pilots, deployment and comprehensive training materials in the use of RFID in a variety of business sectors.