Savi Technology, a provider of real-time solutions for global supply chain security and asset management, announced a contract with the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense (UK MoD) to deploy radio frequency identification (RFID) systems, infrastructure and consulting services to track and manage military supplies end-to-end while in-transit from storage depots to front-line operations. Information about shipment status and location — whether by truck, rail, ocean or air — is captured in real time by a global network of fixed and portable handheld RFID readers, and transmitted to highly secured software systems operated by both the UK MoD and the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).
This is Savi’s first government defense-related partnership outside the U.S. DoD, for which Savi has helped build and maintain the in-transit component of the Total Asset Visibility (TAV) network, the world’s largest active RFID cargo tracking system that spans more than 40 countries and 400 locations. The latest contract culminates a lengthy selection process by the UK MoD to leverage proven best-of-breed automatic identification technologies (AIT) to improve operational efficiency and administrative productivity, speed up deployment and response times, cut costs associated with excess inventory, and automate and unify fragmented data bases by using a common information infrastructure.
Savi’s contract with the Defense Logistics Organization (DLO) initially calls for affixing about 15,000 410 Series SaviTags onto conveyances such as ISO containers and pallets that are moved by trucks, rail cars, ships and air cargo planes. The smart tags communicate over radio frequencies with strategically placed readers, which in turn transmit information on the status of the shipment to a Web-based software system used by the UK MoD. The result enables the British Army, Royal Air Force and Royal Navy to have real-time visibility of the conveyances and their contents, which range from food to ammunition, while being moved in-transit from about 20 UK depots to operational sites. The order also calls for sophisticated handheld reading devices, fixed and portable automatic data collection “readers,” as well as “Retrievers,” which process and translate the data from the RFID hardware readers into computer language understood by software systems used by both the UK MoD and U.S.
For more information, visit www.savi.com
