Imagine that hospital and healthcare facility shelves could continually and automatically broadcast what items reside on each specific shelf at any time! The ability to instantaneously track the movement of controlled substances, critical supplies, or other assets is now a reality. This is impossible today in the world of bar codes.

AC Corporation's "smart shelves" are designed to effectively perform this function. Continuous cycle counting is possible with no human intervention. Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology makes this possible and the results are nothing short of revolutionary to the way supply chain systems and their resulting financial performances are measured.

iTAG® Smart Shelf product solutions incorporate custom designed antennas into the shelves. Items placed on the shelves have RFID tags or labels affixed to the items. RFID readers detect signals from the tags placed on shelf items and communicate vital information to the server via iTAG® software. Information about the shelf items such as unique identification number, time, and location are collected and displayed automatically and without human intervention. Additional features that can be easily incorporated include continuous cycle count with no human intervention and "who removed the item" capability.

iTAG® Smart Shelf can be used in hospital and pharmacy settings as well as vendor managed inventory (VMI) industrial settings. One of the key advantages AC Corporation has built into its total solution product plans is the concept of one product design configurable to a wide range of application settings. The advantages of this approach include cost effective development, low cost production and a cost effective maintenance system.

iTAG® Smart Shelf Specifications

Performance

Read distance from tag....................................................1" - 3'
Read: Orientation Sensitive.............................................Yes
Anti-Collision Capability..................................................Yes
# Items that can be read...................................................100+
Simultaneous ID................................................................Up to 50 tags/sec
Read/Write Capability......................................................Yes

Environmental                                                 

Operating Temperature.....................................................-20 C to +55 C
Conditions to Avoid                                         
  -Water..................................................................................Moderate Impact                                              
  -Contact with the Human Body..............................................Moderate Impact                                              
  -Metal...................................................................................Need 1/4' + offset from metal                            
  -Tags to tag direct contact.....................................................Need 1/4" + offset between tags

iTAG® Smart Shelf Dimensions

Custom Designed by...........................................................Custom design (or retrofit)
AC Corporation
Typical Design Example.....................................................3' wide x 2' deep x 2' high

System Components

1. iTAG® RFID Readers
     - Fixed position...............................................................Wired or Wireless LAN
     - Hand held.....................................................................Optional

  2. iTAG® Software.........................................................Manages Readers to Legacy interface

  3. iTAG® Smart Labels and tags...................................Various sizes to meet application needs

  4. iTAG® Antennas........................................................Custom designed for application

Our solutions are centered around the new ePC™ standard proposals from the Auto ID Center. We buy readers and tags from companies who also support these standards, and we build around those basic technology components the complete package required to make the elusive "smart store" dream a reality.

A key to our exceptional solution scalability and cost-effectiveness is our antenna networking technology - a technology developed at AC Corporation specifically to make the large-scale “smart store” possible.

By building the antennas into the standard fixtures (new or retrofit) and using our patent-pending approach to controlling those antennas we can reduce the electronic components required for the job by as much as an order of magnitude over conventional multiplexing approaches.