Today on the menu: TechTalk

By Tabea Estermann March 12, 2017 Discover ShuQi project

Last week we spoke about the RFID technology. This week we are explaining the process more in detail. There are different types of RFID technologies. Each one uses different frequencies and has different properties. We resume three main technologies for your information.

To start, we have to introduce some basic elements. The wireless communication consists of the frequency and the protocol. The former determines the speed of the electromagnetic field. The later is the language used, which is using certain standards to transfer information. It can be compared to our languages. A device using a certain protocol is like a person who only speaks German and hence can’t communicate with a person who only speaks Spanish. The same is true for the devices with different protocols. The electromagnetic field is more abstract and has a support function. It represents the mean of communication like a paper or a human voice.

Now to the different possibilities we have in for product.
First, there is the RFID LF (low frequency), which works at 125kHz. It’s used for very short distances and can work in water. For this reason and because the tag is conveniently small, it is commonly used for animals.

Second, there is the RFID HF (high frequency). It’s also known by the name NFC (Near field communication), since the distance of communication can go up to 10cm. It works at 13.56MHz and is used in our credit cards to pay contactless. Thank to this big scale, the reader for this frequency is relatively cheap.

The third technology is the RFID UHF (ultra high frequency). It can work up to 5 meters (using a bigger antenna). The tags are exceptionally cheap because they’re easy to manufacture. The RFID readers however are quite expensive, because they are comprised of a recent technology and can read up 200 tag per second. It is used in the industry to manage inventories.

For our project we have chosen RFID UHF since it’s the only RFID that reads up to 30cm. This is the minimum reach we will need for our product.

This week we also continued the interviews with our potential early adapters we have already started in the last weeks. Thereby we gained insights into the more general concept of forgetting things, packing and moving around. We validated several of our assumptions in the value proposition and got new ideas about the features, our app should have to serve our clients best. We will explain this more closely in next week’s blog.

 

Stay tuned and see you soon again!