RFID based production and distribution management systems for home appliance industry

The goal of the paper is to provide RFID based management methodologies for the production and distribution processes in the life cycle management of home appliances. Major hardware components and software functions of the process management systems are described as a combination case of closed-loop and open-loop applications. For the closed-loop application in factories, HF RFID tray tags, workstation readers and smart vehicles are employed to bridge the gaps between ERP systems and automatic monitoring systems in the production process. While for the open-loop application outside of factories, UHF RFID product tags and RFID gates are used to monitor the changes of product locations and states in the distribution process. The combination application has built up information tunnels between data islands existed in the life cycle of home appliances and realized comprehensive tracking and tracing for efficient management.