Technology

UHF RFID

Our tracking system TaaS, Textiles as a Service, is the product of integrating UHF RFID with other innovative technologies. RFID, an acronym for Radio Frequency Identification, is a wireless communication technology that uses radio waves to identify and track objects. Over the last 20 years, it has been commercialized, and is used in areas as diverse as supply chain and tracking cows in a field.

RFID belongs to a group of technologies referred to as Automatic Identification and Data Capture (AIDC). AIDC methods automatically identify objects, collect data about them, and transmit those data directly into computer systems with little or no human intervention. At LossLess Group, we use an ultra-high frequency form of the technology: UHF RFID.

UHF RFID offers a read range that allows us to track both individual items and bulk shipments. We focus primarily on industrial textiles that are used in hospitality and healthcare. You would be surprised to learn how many hotels and hospitals have difficulty managing their expensive bed sheets, pillowcases and towels.

In your daily life, you probably already work with a technology that is based on RFID protocols. When you pay for groceries by holding your credit card or mobile phone close to a chip card reader, the communication between the two is through NFC.

The difference between RFID and NFC is the distance over which communication takes place, and the name NFC makes this clear: Near Field Communication. It’s the reason you have to hold your phones so close together when you’re sharing photos with a friend of that great vacation in Florida.

My colleague Benoit de Backer has written an article on ‘The true cost of connected linen’. In it, he explains in some detail the various components of the UHF RFID tag we use at LossLess Group. Our focus has always been on delivering benefits from an integrated system, but you may be interested in a bit more detail of the underlying technology, in which RFID plays a big role.