Wal-Mart and RFID - Beyond Dillman

The proliferation of RFID continues beyond the scope of Wal-Mart visionary and former CIO Linda Dillman. This is good, since many throughout the industry wondered about the company's true strategy for and commitment to RFID.

As a pioneer in applying this technology to the retail world, Wal-Mart mandated that 100 suppliers tag their products starting in 2005 under Linda Dillman's role as CIO ... resulting in an extraordinary 16% reduction in out-of-stock items.

Today, Wal-Mart Stores' new chief information officer -- Rollin Ford -- continues to expand on technology enhancements like RFID. "There will be no slowing down. RFID will transform the way we do business."

Ford did get one thing wrong - RFID will actually transform the way EVERYONE does business.

Web Merchants Fighting Costs of Fraud

The Associated Press ran a story today on web merchants and how they plan to fight the increasing costs of fraud - now pegged at hundreds of millions of dollars each year with Internet sales. Why?

According to the article, payment fraud plagues Internet merchants more than bricks-and-mortar outlets since online transactions don't require customer signatures or credit card imprints.

Intellareturn Take: While there are many ways to address these acts of fraud, the techniques of those committing the crimes will always change. EBags takes a non-tech approach by calling before shipping orders. While effective, this is also a time-consuming process. To optimize time and costs, we believe that RFID can provide a great platform with substantiating returns -- both for legitimate and unethical customers.