A new study shows smaller firms have dominated some segments of Wal-Marts RFID roll out. Incucomm released the results in its new study, Wal-Marts RFID Deployment – How is it Going?"
Dallas, TX (PRWEB) January 10, 2005 -- The study reports some Wal-Mart suppliers are routinely achieving 100% read rates. It provides an assessment of the tasks that still face suppliers not performing at this level, or who lack the capacity to ship in volumes needed in late 2005.
The study details the market share won to date by various RFID vendors. In some segments, established Auto ID firms like Zebra and Symbol are faring well.
But, established RFID silicon vendors are using a 'fast follower' strategy, and so far are giving up market share to newer firms like Alien and Impinj. Incucomms research raises questions about the viability of the strategy used by TI and Philips.
Incucomms research showed that SAP was the only major enterprise software provider capturing significant RFID related market share.
Smaller firms such as R4 and Xterprise are also dominating systems integration efforts. A telephone survey of more than 100 Wal-Mart suppliers indicates this will probably continue, since few of them use large firms for systems integration today.
Even among the top 10 Wal-Mart suppliers, Incucomm's research showed that some had conducted RFID systems integration internally, and some had used small firms, such as Xterprise. The fact that only about half of largest suppliers have a Big Five integrator suggests a tough sales environment in the smaller Wal-Mart suppliers.
In the IT services segment, large firms as a group have less than a 35% market in most years," said Steve Roemerman, CEO of Incucomm. So, it is not a surprise that smaller firms are having a degree of success in RFID.
In addition, Roemerman said that the purchase decision makers for RFID solutions often included operations, warehousing, and distribution managers. These kinds of managers are pragmatic, and are not easily swayed by assurances based only on brand name," Roemerman said.
Based on discussions with executives from the major IT systems integrators, Incucomm found they agreed that RFID had not generated major re-engineering projects, and that smaller firms would probably enjoy an ongoing market share advantage. We believe the larger firms will partner with the smaller RFID specialists in 2005 or 2006," Roemerman said, and, we believe the early evidence will be clear in 2005."
The a free synopsis of the study is available at www.incucomm.com
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