Zebra Technologies brings out new RFD 8500 barcode reader

Zebra Technologies announced the availability of the RFD8500 – its first multi-operating system RFID sled, which is designed to easily add high-performance RFID and 1D/2D bar code scanning to Android and iOS mobile devices in Asia Pacific. RFD8500 also cost-effectively transforms Zebra mobile devices such as the TC55 and MC40 into handheld RFID readers.

RFID technologies are enabling widespread changes in multiple industries across Asia Pacific over the years, especially in the areas of inventory management, warehousing management, and tracking. The RFD8500 can be utilised in many verticals including retail, logistics, healthcare, manufacturing, and commercial services. With its 600 tags per second read speed, RFD8500 has proven to address business challenges such as performance and productivity.

Bob Sanders, senior VP, Zebra Tech. stated that “Zebra’s RFD8500 sled provides investment protection to businesses that want to leverage their existing mobile device strategy and augment it with our RFID and bar code data collection capabilities. The RFD8500 offers numerous innovative design and technology features that will help organizations improve worker productivity and simplify inventory processes with the mobile device and operating system that best meet their needs.”

“RFD8500 will address fundamental business needs like flexibility, operational visibility, performance, durability, and ease-of-use. As economies in Asia Pacific grow steadily, companies are competing on various battlegrounds for bigger market share and more customers. At the same time, they are trying to curb or reduce cost. The RFD8500 is a cost-effective option for achieving these goals by enabling multiple applications including managing product stocks, locating items, planning shipments, tracking assets and data.” said Ryan Goh, VP and general manager, Zebra Tech, Asia Pacific

KEY FEATURES

The RFD8500 RFID reader enables businesses to leverage previous mobile device investments by adding world-class data collection capabilities.

Zebra’s lightweight, ergonomic RFD8500 sled offers full-shift battery life, making it ideal for inventory and asset management, product search and replenishment applications in retail stores, warehouses and healthcare environments.

The new RFD8500 reader provides businesses with the flexibility to communicate with a variety of host devices to read and write to EPC Class 1 Gen2 UHF tags and capture 1D and 2D barcodes via Bluetooth. The RFD8500 also supports select features of the EPC Gen 2v2 standard providing retailers with additional protection of consumer privacy and against counterfeit products.

The RFD8500 sled’s patent-pending antenna technology represents a breakthrough design that provides maximum omni-directional range, read/write performance and coverage.

The RFD8500 sled is available with a comprehensive accessory ecosystem including multiple adaptors that enable devices to easily mount onto the sled for easy single-handed operation.