Symbol, IBM and Philips Unveil RFID EPC Gen 2 Solution
HOLTSVILLE, N.Y.-/June 13, 2005 - Wi-Fi Technology News/- Symbol Technologies, Inc., The Enterprise Mobility Company(TM), IBM and Royal Philips Electronics today demonstrated RFID EPC Generation 2 (Gen 2) showing simultaneous interoperability between EPC Gen 2 tags and class 0 and class 1 Gen 1 tags. This demonstration marks the start of Symbol's Gen 2 Early Adopter program, announced in 2004, and designed to migrate customers to Gen 2 at the pace their business requires without costly disruption to their current RFID system.
Symbol will simultaneously support the Gen 1 and Gen 2 standards on its reader infrastructure while helping customers manage their transition from Gen 1 tags to Gen 2 tags. Symbol Gen 2 Early Adopter customers and partners can view the demo and will be able to evaluate prototype Gen 2 tags and reader infrastructure in the coming months. This will ease the evolution through simultaneous support of Gen 2 and Gen 1 in preparation for the broad commercial release of Gen 2 solutions.
The Gen 2 demo incorporates Symbol's new XR400 reader with IBM's WebSphere® RFID software platform and is another step in Symbol and IBM's alliance to develop complete mobile business solutions and applications for customers. Philips is a Symbol Electronic Product Code (EPC) Gen 2 technology partner.
"Our collaboration with Symbol on this demo will prove the viability of Gen 2 and spur customer adoption," said Dr. Robert Mayberry, VP of IBM Sensor and Actuator Solutions. "By combining our core strengths in RFID deployment, Symbol and IBM can help customers use RFID technologies to realize the efficiency and visibility benefits they are seeking. We formed this alliance in 2001 and RFID is a great opportunity to extend our relationship to deliver future solutions to our customers."
"We are excited to be collaborating with two proven RFID leaders to provide Gen 2 solutions to customers in Symbol's Gen 2 Early Adopter Program," said Jan-Willem Reynaerts, General Manager of Philips Semiconductors' RFID business. "By jointly helping customers to this new global standard, we are enabling them to experience the benefits of deploying RFID across multinational infrastructures sooner."
"Symbol is leveraging its experience in the deployment of Gen 1 technology by integrating it with Gen 2 to ease the transition for customers already utilizing RFID in production," said John Bruno, senior vice president and general manager of RFID at Symbol Technologies. "Along with RFID leaders IBM and Philips, Symbol is committed to full, multi-protocol support for customers looking for one, flexible solution to meet multiple needs today and in the future. We are confident that our strong alliance with IBM and partnership with Philips will continue to drive Gen 2 adoption."
Gen 2 represents a simplification and expansion of the existing EPC Generation 1 standard, and allows the opportunity for a single, global standard to help grow the RFID market. Gen 2 emerged from a standards process managed by EPCglobal, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Uniform Code Council and EAN International, the global standards bodies responsible for the broad adoption of the Universal Product Code (UPC) bar code. A founding member of EPCglobal, Symbol supports both Gen 1 and Gen 2 EPC technology with readers that are currently firmware upgradeable to Gen 2 and versions of Gen 2 tags that will soon be available.
More information on Symbol's family of RFID solutions is available at
http://www.symbol.com/rfid.
About Symbol Technologies
Symbol Technologies, Inc., The Enterprise Mobility Company(TM), is a recognized worldwide leader in enterprise mobility, delivering products and solutions that capture, move and manage information in real time to and from the point of business activity. Symbol enterprise mobility solutions integrate advanced data capture products, radio frequency identification technology, mobile computing platforms, wireless infrastructure, mobility software and world-class services programs under the Symbol Enterprise Mobility Services brand. Symbol enterprise mobility products and solutions are proven to increase workforce productivity, reduce operating costs, drive operational efficiencies and realize competitive advantages for the world's leading companies. More information is available at
http://www.symbol.com.
About IBM
IBM is the world's largest information technology company, with 80 years of leadership in helping businesses innovate. IBM works with companies of all sizes around the world to deploy a full range of IBM technologies and services. IBM WebSphere is the market-leading Internet infrastructure software, or middleware, for building, running and integrating business applications across a variety of computing platforms. Built according to clients' desire for innovative, standards-based, highly reliable and scalable software, WebSphere software is used by tens of thousands of companies and other organizations. For more information about IBM, visit
http://www.ibm.com.
About Philips
Royal Philips Electronics of the Netherlands is one of the world's biggest electronics companies and Europe's largest, with sales of EUR 30.3 billion in 2004. With activities in the three interlocking domains of healthcare, lifestyle and technology and 160,900 employees in more than 60 countries, it has market leadership positions in medical diagnostic imaging and patient monitoring, color television sets, electric shavers, lighting and silicon system solutions. News from Philips is located at
http://www.semiconductors.philips.com.
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