Fabio Belloni is Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Quuppa and a leading authority on advanced location technologies.
getty
For years, the growth of real-time location systems (RTLS) in manufacturing was limited by practical scaling challenges. Active tags that broadcast live locations with pinpoint precision were primarily used to track high-value or operation-critical assets, as they were relatively expensive and required extensive infrastructure.
It simply wasn’t practical to use active RTLS tags for high-volume, low-cost items like single-use containers, boxes and parcels, because the price per tag did not decrease significantly as the number of assets increased.
Emerging technology is now enabling tracking of low-cost items at scale, one of which is the development of printed, environmentally friendly zinc paper batteries. These batteries can be used to produce low-cost, biodegradable and disposable tags. They are designed not for long-term reuse, but for high-volume deployment.
In doing so, these batteries can help shift RTLS from a selective tracking tool into a system capable of capturing the movement of entire process flows. As the CEO of Quuppa, a provider of RTLS solutions, I wanted to share some of the ways these novel tags are remaking the location solutions market for high-value assets and entire process flows.
Before understanding where RTLS is heading, it helps to start with its long-standing counterpart.
As a counterweight to RTLS, radio frequency identification (RFID) is currently one of the most widely used tracking technologies in industrial and logistics environments. It works using passive (battery-less) tags—small, inexpensive labels with no internal power source—that are read by a nearby reader.
Historically, RFID and RTLS have occupied opposite ends of the spectrum.
RFID offered extremely low-cost tags but limited visibility, relying on physical scanning at specific checkpoints: An asset may be scanned when it enters and exits a facility through chokepoints, but between scanning events, its location remains unknown.
RTLS, on the other hand, provided continuous, real-time tracking throughout the whole facility at a significantly higher cost.
But a new type of disposable RTLS tag is beginning to bridge that gap. By reducing the cost of active (battery-powered) tags to around one dollar per device at scale, RTLS has the potential to be applied to use cases that were previously dominated by RFID. At the same time, it offers capabilities that RFID doesn't, including continuous tracking, visibility monitoring and presence detection, as well as sensor-based insights.
The result is a convergence of the two technologies. Rather than choosing between cheap but limited visibility and expensive but comprehensive tracking, organizations can begin to access a middle ground: low-cost, scalable and real-time visibility.
To understand how this convergence is becoming possible, it helps to look at how the next generation of RTLS battery-powered electronic tags is actually being built.
Across the industry, companies are tackling different pieces of the challenge. Battery developers such as Enfucell have helped commercialize and scale printed paper battery technology, while companies such as Avery Dennison and Identiv are developing smart labels that, unlike traditional barcodes, emit wireless signals that can be detected without manual scanning. Meanwhile, firms such as Minew and MokoSmart are developing low-cost Bluetooth hardware aimed at large-scale logistics and industrial deployments.
Most tags contain lithium batteries, but novel disposable tags are constructed with paper batteries. These batteries are thin, flexible and significantly cheaper to produce, even if they only last for a limited period; e.g., between two weeks and a few months. That trade-off is by design: Instead of designing for longevity, these tags are designed to last just long enough to track an item through its lifecycle or its shipment transit time.
Alongside the battery, the printed circuit board itself is evolving. Instead of rigid boards, manufacturers are increasingly using printed electronics on flexible substrates. This allows the entire tag to bend, conform to curved surfaces and paste seamlessly onto packaging: a thin, flexible Bluetooth tag that can be applied like a sticker.
Another key factor in reducing the bill of materials (BOM) is the use of simplified, low-cost radio chips powered by the novel battery. Ultra-low-power Bluetooth chips require very little energy from the battery.
Crucially, these tags are designed for ease of use. A peel-to-activate mechanism means that removing the backing paper completes the circuit and starts transmission automatically. There is no need for pairing, configuration or user interaction.
In environments such as warehouses, production lines and logistics hubs, the biggest barrier to RTLS adoption has been as much operational as financial. Active reusable tags must be collected, recharged, reattached and sometimes even cleaned or sanitized in environments like hospitals, introducing additional labor and resources.
Disposable tags can eliminate these bottlenecks. Instead of managing a pool of reusable devices, organizations can adopt a simpler workflow: print, apply, track and discard. This mirrors existing labeling processes, making adoption far more efficient.
Just as importantly, single-use tags allow tracking at a much finer level of granularity. Rather than tagging containers or pallets, it becomes feasible to track individual items as they move through a system. This unlocks a deeper level of visibility into material flows, enabling precise measurement of dwell times, identification of bottlenecks and continuous optimization of processes.
However, the most obvious limitation is lifespan. Traditional active (lithium) RTLS tags are often designed to operate for years, making them well-suited to tracking forklifts, tools, medical equipment and other long-lived assets. Disposable (zinc) tags, by contrast, are designed to operate for weeks or months.
When active battery-powered tags become low-cost and disposable, visibility is no longer reserved for high-value assets. That changes the role of RTLS itself to be like RFID for asset management operations.
It moves from a selective monitoring tool into a continuous layer of operational visibility, capable of capturing how entire systems behave, not just where individual assets are. In that sense, the real shift is the expansion of what organizations can see, measure and optimize in real time.
Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
此内容由惯性聚合(RSS阅读器)自动聚合整理，仅供阅读参考。 原文来自 — 版权归原作者所有。