Mojix UHF RFID enabled RTI management at the REWE Group in Germany

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The REWE Group

The concept

REWE DC’s ship products daily to all stores

using pallets, roll cages and cool boxes. The

pallets come from the EPAL pallet pool, but

the approx. 850.000 roll cages (value 60

euro) and approx. 30.000 coolboxes, which

are used for frozen food, meat, fish, etc.

(value 600 euro) are owned by REWE.

Like in many similar cases, REWE annually

loses a significant amount of these Retur-

The business case for RFID technology

With 327.600 staff members in 12

countries and annual revenue of 50

billion Euro revenue, the REWE Group

is Germany’s second largest retailer and

Europe’s number three. In Germany, the

Group operates two retail brands, REWE

and Penny Market that employ together

226.000 heads and generate a revenue

of 36 billion Euro. REWE is the group’s

premium retail company, whereas the

Penny brand is a discount formula. The

15.500 stores in Germany are supplied

by 32 warehouses spread out across the

country.

All RTI’s have been “tagged” with uniquely

identifiable barcode/RFID tags. In the REWE

Distribution Centre’s the products in the

rollcage or coolbox are barcode scanned to the

GS1 GRAI number (Global Returnable Asset

Identifier) of the load carrier (1). The GRAI is

subsequently barcode or RFID scanned when

it is loaded on the truck (2). The GRAI is then

posted to the balance of the store.

Once the container is received at the store,

nable Transport Items (RTI’s) in their supply

chain. Apart from the financial loss, having

insufficient RTI’s available can also result

in stagnation of the supply to the stores.

To secure supply, occasionally rush orders

are placed to replace the missing rollcages

or coolboxes, without knowing if the RTI’s

can be found back. An annual loss of 5% is

not unheard off. REWE didn’t keep records

of the RTI quantities shipped to stores, or

received back, because of the administrative

workload associated with keeping track of

the RTI’s.

Therefore, to improve the control of it’s

RTI’s across REWE’s complex supply chain,

the company looked at RFID technology to

automatically register the movements of all

items.

the driver barcode scans the GRAI with his

handheld device to post the goods to the

store inventory (3). The RTI posting done

at the DC is also confirmed with this scan.

Empty RTI’s collected by the drive from the

The technology

REWE selected Mojix UHF RFID technology,

a GS1/EPCGlobal standards-based

innovative reader solution that uses an

extremely powerful Phased Array receiver

(“STAR”) that is able to read and locate RFID

tags over a distance of 200 meter, when they

are powered up be simple, cheap distributed

tag exciters (excitation or E-nodes),

controlled by the STAR.

REWE tested this technology extensively for

the staging, shipping and the waste disposal

(receiving) processes in a reference site in

Buttenheim, near Nürnberg and confirmed

its superior technical performance, cost

The concept that REWE pursued is described clearly in the chart below:

efficiency and scalability, based on which

the decision was taken in the autumn of

store are barcode scanned to the DC (4). But

this is only confirmed by the RFID scan at the

disposal area in the DC (5) where drivers off-

load the RTI’s (and used packaging materials

from the stores is separated, processed and

sold).

As REWE supplies its stores on set

frequencies, the dwell times of the RTI’s can

be exactly calculated. When an RTI in a store

exceeds this dwell time, the system launches

an automatic reminder to return the asset,

and a second warning if this is not followed

up adequately. If this is not adhered to, the

store is charged with the cost of the RTI.

2009 to commence the first stage of the roll-

out program in the summer of 2010.

The roll-out program The roll-out program

After an extensive selection procedure

Mieloo & Alexander was selected as

Preferred Integration Partner to roll-out the

Mojix technology to all REWE and Penny

DC’s across Germany. Mieloo & Alexander

subcontracted Nokia Siemens Network

Services (NSN-S) for the physical installation

and cabling.

This first stage consists of tagging all 30.000

coolboxes, building the EPCIS repository

and the RTI balance management system,

and implementing the DC commissioning

and shipping processes based on barcode

scanning and deploying the Mojix RFID

technology to the Waste Disposal areas of

22 DC’s in Germany. Mieloo & Alexander

was responsible for:

Roll-out program management;

Site surveys and system design;

Configuration, training and acceptance

testing;

Management of Nokia Siemens Network

Services and other subcontractors;

Material logistics (Mojix equipment,

cherry pickers, and tools to all site

surveys);

Training of the support organisation.

Mieloo & Alexander Business Integrators is a logistics consultancy firm and RFID integrator specialised in “technology

enabled supply chain improvement”. As supply chain and logistics advisors we support our clients with their supply chain

strategy, process redesign and with planning and managing the transformation project. And as RFID integrators, we help

our customers to realise the benefits of AutoID technology and to improve and innovate their internal and collaborative

business processes. We also offer standardised, modular supply chain solutions for Horticulture (ScanGreen), Asset

Tracking (ScanTrack), biometric Time & Attendance registration (ScanTime), Linen Management (ScanBlue) and Apparel

(TracEye). Mieloo & Alexander is based in Amsterdam and has a sales office in Rothenburg, Germany.

For more information, visit www.mielooandalexander.com.

About Mieloo & Alexander Business Integrators