RFID's Impact on Logistic Operations: Towards a Comprehensive Empirical Assessment

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is an information technology whose appeal to practitioners and researchers remains high. Although an impressive amount of research addresses its use in various applications, its impact on logistic operations, where it is expected to yield the most significant benefits, has been poorly understood to date. In particular, stringent empirical research along these lines is still missing and many questions remain unanswered. Which generic activities are crucial when introducing RFID in logistic processes? Are detailed planning, expertise, standards, and collaboration with business partners actually essential to achieve RFID profitability or is RFID introduction easier than expected by most decision makers. Does most of the value created by RFID projects come from improved automation, visibility, or completely new ways to do business? In order to answer these questions, we have designed a survey instrument which is described and evaluated in this paper. The hypotheses motivated in this document will soon be tested using a representative sample of RFID adopters and the structural equation modelling methodology.