Wal-Mart's CIO: 'RFID best thing since sliced bread'

The newly appointed CIO at retail giant Wal-Mart has been singing the praises of RFID.

Rollin Ford, the US chain's executive VP and CIO, promised at a Wal-Mart sponsored CIO conference last week to pursue the rollout of the tracking technology as fervently as his predecessor.

He said in a statement: "There will be no slowing down. RFID will transform the way we do business."

Wal-Mart has been pioneering the use of the controversial technology in the retail world since it mandated 100 suppliers tag their products from the start of 2005.

Linda Dillman, the company's previous CIO, had overseen Wal-Mart's ambitious RFID plans but moved to become the retailer's executive VP of risk management and benefits administration earlier this month.

Under Dillman, Wal-Mart released some of the RFID project's findings, revealing it resulted in a 16 per cent reduction in the number of times products went out of stock.

Ford will now be in charge of the next wave of RFID, known as Gen2. He said in a statement: "When Gen2 was released we planned to make it our standard at the beginning of this year. We have done that, and I can confirm that we will be sunsetting Gen1 on 30 June."

Ford also revealed that Wal-Mart's tech team and its vendors have overcome one of the major problems cited by would-be item level taggers: the failure of RFID to work on vessels holding liquids or made of metal.

As well as moving the chain to Gen2 tags, Ford will also be overseeing the expansion of the RFID rollout from the start of next year, when the number of suppliers tagging their goods will rise to 600.