WiFi Jedi.com

Ruby?

Ruby?  No, RuBee.  The new IEEE Standard for wireless visibility networks.  RuBee is an alternative to other RFID technologies such as UHF, HF, etc.  How does it compare to these other technologies?  The new IEEE standard, IEEE 1902.1, is intended for providing low bandwidth where low cost, high tag count, and long battery life are requirements. RuBee operates below 450 Khz and is especially effective in harsh environments such as around metal and water.  These have traditionally been problem areas with other RFID products.

However, RuBee only provides speeds of 300 to 9600 baud, which might present an issue for many applications.  RuBee has a respectable range of 10 to 50 feet and is expected to be implemented in hospital environments, and high security government facilities.

There seem to be many competing technologies to RuBee.  Recently, there have been many advances to passive-UHF RFID tags.  The read ranges now quite frankly shock me.  There also have been ongoing improvements in the amount of data stored in UHF tags as well as the security of tag.  Active RFID & RTLS have also been gaining momentum.  In that sense, I really think it is an uphill battle for any new technology where there are existing technologies that already serve the market place. At the end of the day, I think that IEEE approving a new standard will go a long way to commercializing the product and encouraging more wide spread adoption.

What do you think?  Is RuBee going to be widely used and accepted?  In what industries?  In what applications?  How is it going to be better and/or different than exisiting RFID technologies. Post what you think in the comment section below.