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Companies eyeing RFID innovations are facing severe recruitment difficulties because of a shortage of available expertise in the emerging technology, according to industry research. The talent pool of professionals skilled in radio frequency identification is already too narrow according to 80% of organisations, which fear the shortage could hurt the technology’s successful adoption. This is according to the Computing Technology Association (CTA), which says two-thirds of businesses face massive challenges to train and educate their employees so they can succeed in the RFID market. The group said that eight out of ten companies feel there are simply not enough professionals with the skills to implement; service and support RFID technology. As a result, only 16% of organisations are at the stage of implementing one or more RFID pilot projects for themselves or their customers. The news comes as the US government is expected to rocket its RFID spending 120% by 2009, according to analysis from Input. “We believe the market needs hundreds of systems integration companies with RFID capabilities; and hundreds of thousands of individuals knowledgeable in this technology to meet current and future demand,” said David Sommer, vice-president at CTA. The Association added that uptake of RFID was expectedly low among customers, especially where companies had failed to offer the technology themselves. However, just under half of organisations said they would be watching their clients over the next three years to gauge any demand for RFID, compared to 37% planning it as a certainty. Out of those opting for the new technology, most expect to offer hardware installation and maintenance services (82.1%), followed by software implementations (61.5%) and other services (51.3%). Analysis from Input indicates uptake of RFID will quicken, once the business case on the available cost benefits has swayed business executives. In the US, where the Defence department is testing the technology, RFID contracts have mostly been awarded to smaller firms specialising in RFID and supply chain management. “We expect this trend to continue in the near-term because adoption of RFID will continue to be at the program level versus agency-wide,” said Chris Campbell, senior analyst at Input. “[However] in the long-term, as RFID becomes more widely accepted, contract awards will begin to shift toward the larger IT firms that offer a full suite of professional services and will be able to walk federal agencies through the design, integration, and training needed to fully integrate RFID systems into the business processes of an agency.” Campbell warned that the biggest challenge facing government agencies adopting the technology is the challenge to develop “system architecture to handle substantially increased amounts of data.” He added that concern from the public focused on privacy and security issues and how exactly personal information would be stored, amid growing concern about the alarming increase in identity theft. Mar 7, 2005 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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