Wal-Mart could increase sales by $287m by fixing just a small portion of its inventory problems using radio frequency identification technology, and that could be just the start, a company executive says.
The world's largest retailer is gearing up to roll out the RFID gear to make that prediction a reality in its 4,068 North American stores. The key behind it all is making sure RFID tags are installed on all products and using a forklift with RFID equipment installed to show the driver exactly where merchandise is inside store warehouses.
It's a big issue for Wal-Mart, says Ron Moser, RFID strategy leader at Wal-Mart. The company is widely seen as one of the world's top drivers of RFID technology, but it has had some missteps. It missed a goal last year of installing RFID technology in 12 of 137 distribution centers, and an April target to have RFID technology in place at 1,000 retail stores. So far, it has RFID installed in 975 stores.
Source: Computerworld, http://computerworld.com