Radio

I deliberated in finding you a result, never the less I will give you an unbiased view point and give you a pragmatic answer. Consequently I have prepared a list of bullet points for and against for the answer.

For

• Good phone signals are in place, so a teacher can easily contact others (via mobile phone) if the conditions are stormy.
• If a phone mass was put into place, company’s across the country would manufacture there businesses nearby, so all employees could conveniently access strong phone signals meaning Clayton would be popular village meaning a boost in local economy…
• People would see Clayton as a more business friendly town, meaning more leisure prospects because companies might set up major offices and buildings…
• Small towns may be transformed into a thriving city because a brilliant signals…
• May bring protesters although they would need transport and accommodation therefore it puts money into the economy again.
• If major company’s construct big offices near by other people may be persuaded to create other things nearby to cater for the business men’s every need for example coffee shops and luxury outlet stores for rich people who work in the offices…
• If thriving company’s start up in the town other buildings will come as well, for example the company may want a building nearby were they can host there website (lots of servers) so they don’t have to travel far to maintain equipment, meaning that they will buy more land leading to estate agents and nearby people gaining lots of money, which will further more be pumped back into the economy…
• If major company’s set up in the nearby town, big companies such as BT etc will feel pressured not to have a office in the town because the town will be popular full of people.
• More shops would appear because the town would be so popular meaning lots of people would buy products from there shop.
• There is no real evidence to suggest that the EM radiation used in cellular communications is harmful.

Against

• There are fears that mobile phone masts present a threat to health, these fears begin with the warming of the brain direct from mobile phones, this leads onto the possible causes of cancer that come from phone masts e.g. brain tumours, this is the cause of microwave radiation.
• You might have trouble sleeping as time goes on and you could be at risk from catching a brain tumour. Also if someone was to stand near a phone mast they might be at risk of catching the flu.
• Seven different studies had concluded that mobile phones could increase the chances of both malignant and benign brain tumours’.
• Can be seen as unattractive for example, if there is elegant view around the town the mast would instantly destroy it. Meaning that if the town is seen as a rural, it is no instantly transformed as an urban town.
• Newcastle is aimed at older people (London is aimed at younger people) Therefore they will be against the change.

How It Works

Mobile phones work using radio signals in a similar way to radio and television. The system is based on geographic areas known as cells. When you make a call, your mobile phone sends a signal to the nearest base station that controls a cell. The base station then transmits the signal through mobile and fixed line networks to connect you.

Cells vary in size depending on location and demand. A large base station may be able to carry 100 to 150 calls simultaneously while a smaller one may only be able to carry around 30 calls. More base stations will be needed in areas where lots of people want to use their mobile phones. There are around 51,000 base stations in the UK, two-thirds of which are integrated into the design of existing buildings or structures.

Conclusion

This is a very debatable subject, however I hope the bullet points I have willingly provided have made it easier for me to make a strong decision… If I was put in charge of making this decision I would be for the telephone mast because it would bring major companies to Newcastle-under-Lyme which would be excellent for the economy, There are about 70 million mobile phones in use in the UK which of whom need to base stations, this is why one should be made in Newcastle because they have to be made!

People may protest and rebel about this although this wouldn’t matter too much because after a while people will forget. If we did put a telephone mast in Newcastle there is a chance that Newcastle under Lyme could be completely transformed for the best! Some major disadvantages would be that it could cause harm towards the civilians and that the change could anger the more older public because they might not like thriving city’s and prefer the quite villages.

The paper will be demonstrating for the first time ever the usage of wireless electrification systems and miniature sensor devices like RIFF passive Tags, that are smaller than a grain of rice and equipped with a tiny antenna which will capture and wirelessly transmit a person’s vital body-function data, such as pulse or body temperature , to an integrated ground station. In addition, the antenna will also receive Information regarding the location of the individual from the GAPS (Global Positioning Satellite) System.

Both sets of data medical Information and location will then be wirelessly transmitted to the ground station and made available to save lives y remotely monitoring the medical conditions of at-risk patients and providing emergency rescue units with the person’s exact location. This paper gives a predicted general model for Heart Failure Alert System. It also discusses the Algorithm for converting the Analog pulse to Binary data in the tag and the Algorithm for Alerting the Location & Tracking Station. It discusses in detail the various stages involved in tracking the exact location of the Victim using this technology. . Illumination It is tough to declare convincingly what is the most Important organ of our DOD Infant every organ has Its own Importance contributing and coordinating superbly to keep the wonderful machine the human body functioning smoothly. And one of the primary organs which the body cannot do without is the heart, 72 beats a minute or over a trillion in a lifetime. The pump house of our body pumping the blood to every corner of our body every moment, thus sending oxygen and nutrients to each and every cell.

Over a period of time, the heart muscles go weak, the arteries get blocked and sometimes because of a shock a part of the heart stops functioning resulting in what is called a HEART ATTACK. Heart attack is a major cause of death and in today’s tension full world It has become very common. Presently there Is no mechanism by which a device monitors a person’s heart 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and gives him instant protection in case of problem. Our primary focus is on people with a history of heart problem as they are more prone to death due to heart ‘OFF Taller.

In ten II/Us, a group AT clients at ten Lawrence Livermore Larboard realized that a handheld receiver stimulated by RFC power could send back a coded radio signal. Such a system could be connected to a simple computer and used to intro access to a secure facility. This system ultimately became one of the first building entry systems based on the first commercial use of RIFF. RIFF or Radio Frequency identification is a technology that enables the tracking or identification of objects using ICC based tags with an RFC circuit and antenna, and RFC readers that “read” and in some case modify the information stored in the ICC memory.

RIFF is an automated data-capture technology that can be used to electronically identify, track, and store information about groups of products, individual items, or product components. The technology consists of three key pieces: ; RIFF tags. ; RIFF readers. ; A data collection and management system. RIFF tags: RIFF tags are small or miniaturized computer chips programmed with information about a product or with a number that corresponds to information that is stored in a database. The tags can be located inside or on the surface of the product, item, or packing material.

The RFC tags could be divided in two major groups: Passive Group: where the power to energize the tags circuitry is draw from the reader generated field. Active Group: In this case the tag has an internal power resource, in general a battery that could be replaceable or not, in some case this feature limited the tag lifetime, but for some applications this is not important, or the tag is designed to live more than the typical time needed. RIFF readers: RIFF readers are querying systems that interrogate or send signals to the tags and receive the responses.

These responses can be stored within the reader for later transfer to a data collection system or instantaneously transferred to the data collection system. Like the tags themselves, RIFF readers come in many sizes. RIFF traders are usually on, continually transmitting radio energy and awaiting any tags that enter their field of operation. However, for some applications, this is unnecessary and could be undesirable in battery-powered devices that need to conserve energy. Thus, it is possible to configure an RIFF reader so that it sends the radio pulse only in response to an external event.

For example, most electronic toll collection systems have the reader constantly powered upon that every passing car will be recorded. On the other hand, RIFF scanners used in veterinarian’s offices are frequently equipped tit triggers and power up the only when the trigger is pulled. The largest readers malign consist AT a desktop personal computer Walt a special car Ana multiple antennas connected to the card through shielded cable. Such a reader would typically have a network connection as well so that it could report tags that it reads to other computers.

The smallest readers are the size of a postage stamp and are designed to be embedded in mobile telephones. 2. General Model for Heart Failure Alert System The Heart Failure Alert System consists of : ; RIFF Tag (Implanted into Human body). ; RIFF Reader (Placed in a Cellular Phone). Global Positioning Satellite System. ; Locating & Tracking Station. ; Mobile Rescue Units. The grain-sized RIFF tag is implanted into the human body, which keeps track of the heart pulse in the form of voltage levels. A RIFF reader is placed into the cellular phone.

The RIFF reader sends a command to the RIFF tag which in turn sends these voltage pulses in the form of bits using the embedded software in the tag as response which is a continuous process. These bit sequence is then sent to software program in the cellular phone as input and checks for the condition of heart allure. If any sign of failure is sensed then immediately an ALERT Signal will be generated and in turn results in the AUTODIAL to the Locating & tracking station. This station with the use of GAPS system comes to know the whereabouts of the victim. The locating and tracking station also simultaneously alerts the rescue units. . Working of Implanted RIFF Tags Passive RIFF systems typically couple the transmitter to the receiver with either load modulation or backscatter, depending on whether the tags are operating in the near or far field of the reader respectively. In the near field, a tag couples with a reader via electromagnetic inductance. The antennas of both the reader and the tag are formed as coils, using many turns of small gauge wire. The reader communicates with the tag by modulating a carrier wave, which it does by varying the amplitude, phase, or frequency of the carrier, depending on the design of the RIFF system in question.

The tag communicates with the reader by varying how much it loads its antenna. This in turn affects the voltage across the reader’s antenna. By switching the load on and off rapidly, the tag can establish its own carrier frequency really a sub carrier) that the tag can in turn modulate to communicate its reply. Hug: Oral sleaze RIFF lag RIFF tags are smaller than a grain of rice and equipped with a tiny antenna will capture and wirelessly transmit a person’s vital body-function data, such as pulse and do not require line of sight.

These tags are capable of identifying the heart pulses in the form of voltage levels and converts into a bit sequence. The first step in A-D Conversion is Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM). This takes an analog signal, samples it and generates a sequence of pulses based on the results of the Sampling measuring the amplitude at equal intervals) PC (Pulse Code Modulation) quantizes PAM pulses that is the method of assigning integral values in a specific range to sampled instances. The binary encoding of these integral values is done based on the algorithm BIN_ONCE depending on the average heart pulse voltage of the victim (Bag_pulse).

Alga BIN_ONCE: Steps: Read the analog signals from the heart. Steps: Sample the analog signal and generate series of pulses based on the results of sampling based on the tag frequency. Steps: Assign integral values to each sampled instances generated. Steps: Consider every individual sampled unit and ampere with the average voltage level of the heart. Steps: If the sampled instance value is in between the average pulse values then assign BIT=O Otherwise assign BIT-I . Steps: Generate the bit sequence by considering all the generated individual sample instances.

Fig: Analog-Binary Digits Conversion in Tags Working of RIFF reader inside cellular phone: The RIFF reader sends a pulse of radio energy to the tag and listens for the tags response. The tag detects this energy and sends back a response that contains the tags serial number and possibly other information as well. In simple RIFF systems, he reader’s pulse of energy functioned as an on-off switch, in more sophisticated systems, the reader’s RFC signal can contain commands to the tag, instructions to read or write memory that the tag contains.

Historically, RIFF readers were designed to read only a particular kind of tag, RIFF readers are usually on, continually transmitting radio energy and awaiting any tags that enter their field of operation. Fig: RIFF Reader in cellular phone. I en reader continuously sends ten command to ten tags Ana In turn receives ten voltage levels in the form of bit sequence as response from the tags with the help of the BIN_ONCE algorithm. The reader sends the received bit sequence to a software embedded in the cellular phone. In case of detection of a weak heart pulse this software automatically alerts the tracking & location station .

5. Generating Alternatives

As Vice-President (HR) it is important to understand the situation of the company as well the priority needs of employees.  Explain the entire status-of-affairs in which the company is placed in, either by issuing a notice or by conducting a staff meeting.  Tap the need that company requires people who lead the company at this moment by extraordinary skills and company is not looking for those who would like to work for the company.  Young, dynamic, energetic, enthusiastic and motivated staff are required who can contribute to the growth of the company in a short p of time. The company is seriously on the look-out for highly skilled and highly talented and experienced people.

6. Evaluation of Alternatives

Explained two ideas from section five above, using the Restructuring organizations in times of crisis or in acquisitions and mergers, is a general step taken in order to effectively manage organizations and in this aspect, human resources department in conducting interviews, tests, selection process and interviewing process are some of the important tasks to recruit best people.  The management principles of First-in-First-Out (FIFO) and Last-in-First-out (LIFO) can be applied for the purpose of recruitment and layoff.

7. Chosen Alternative

At one point of time, every company passes through some difficult stage, which must not stand as a hindrance to the reputation of a company.  Reputation of a company can never be affected with human resources whereas it is affected only when a company incurs loss or performs poorly in its business operations.  Staying honest even in times of crisis helps a company to regain its position irrespective of competitors pull-down strategies.

8. Implementation Plan

• Action Plan
• Description

Plan

1. Issue notice to staff – To perform well in every area of responsibility
2. Recruitment – Select highly talented and dynamic people
3 Motivation – Conduct work shops to motivate staff
4 Review performance – Meeting once in  a month to review the performance.

According to a report by Barry Collins (2006) 5, by 2006, there were 62. 5 million mobile phones being used in a British population of 60 million people. This trend of more mobile phones than people is set to persist; as at the last quarter of 2008, there were 76 million mobile phones to a population of 61. 4 million, implying more than one handset per person. Fashion, functionality, the need for separate phones for personal and business use amongst other factors have been the drivers of the trend. The MNO industry has typically contributed significantly to the economy.

In the financial year 1998/99, MNOs had an estimated combined revenue of i?? 5. 8 billion, and i?? 15. 6 billion in 2008. They also provide appreciable job opportunities in the UK6. According to Finlay (2000), the remote environment of an industry involves external factors and components that cannot be influenced notably by an individual business but can be the basis for changes that occur in the operating environment. Although the remote environment is similar for all industries, some industries may be affected more by particular factors.

It is for this reason a PEST analysis is carried out for the UK mobile operators industry to highlight those important factors that impinge on the industry. The following aspects are considered below; political/legal, economic, socio-cultural and technological. It is plausible to say that the mobile network operators industry is a highly competitive and therefore, regulated industry. MNOs in the UK are in general governed by regulations which are in the form of industry-specific laws and regulations affecting telecommunications services.

MNOs are also subject to anti-trust/competition laws which affect all industries. The important directives, decisions and regulations by the EU as well as the UK communications regulator Ofcom are discussed below. The European Union (EU) Telecoms Regulatory Framework; the regulatory framework which was adopted in 2002 and has been applied by all member states of the EU consists of directives developed with an aim of ensuring and improving competition within the industry, protecting consumers.

The framework was further reviewed in 2007 3. 11 EU Law on Roaming Charges; Charges for using mobile phone services outside the location where the service was originally registered are an important source of income for network operators. Many mobile phone users find this a convenient service as they can use their already existing network provider when abroad, but often come back to receive higher than expected phone bills. The charges for the roaming service as at 2007 were worth i?? 8. 5bn a year to the European telecoms industry7.

In 2006, the telecoms commissioner called for legislation on roaming arguing that consumers paid an unjustifiable fees for using their mobile phone service abroad. In 2007, members of the EU agreed to force a slash on roaming charges and the legislation was backed by consumer advocates and campaigners. The law came into force in June 2007. The law required that users pay no more than  0. 49 per minute for placing an outgoing call while in another European country and  0. 24 a minute for receiving calls.

The legislation also required that wholesale charges – charge imposed by one operator on another for allowing calls to be made through its network – be capped at  0. 30 per minute during the first year after enactment of the EU law. Charges were to be capped further in the second and third years following the legislation before being scrapped8. Further proposed legislation in March 2009 called for billing for voice calls to be made by the second, for a further cap on voice calls from  0. 46 to  0.25 by July 2011, for cross-border text messages to cost no more that  0. 11 and a cap of  for wholesale downloading of one megabyte of data7.

Under these legislations since 2007, mobile operators have seen a slash in their estimated  8. 5bn income from the roaming market. It is thought by the operators’ trade body that the law is anti-competitive. Protecting the consumers – mobile phone users – may continue to be an issue of concern for the future of the industry as more regulations may be effected. 3.

12 Spectrum Liberalisation; proposals by the office of communications (Ofcom) on the management/allocation of spectrum, has been a major issue of concern for the mobile network operators. Spectrum is a scarce resource important for wireless technology and in May 2000, O2, Vodafone, T-mobile and Orange paid over  22bn between them for spectrum licences to operate the 3G third-generation mobile phone services in the UK, through an auction9. These licenses were granted by regulators to the operators, stating frequency bands, services and technologies in a command and control manner10.

However, a new approach relating to spectrum management has been introduced. On the 29th of May 2006, the European Commission’s Radio Spectrum Committee published proposals for spectrum liberalisation – an approach to spectrum management that puts an end to technological and service restriction on spectrum usage10. Ofcom believe that through spectrum liberalisation, mobile operators would be able to launch new technologies and services, competition would be encouraged and it will give opportunity for new entrants into the highly competitive industry11.

Ofcom proposed to make available to other operators, some of the 900MHz radio spectrum currently used by Vodafone and O2 and the 1800MHz used by the four providers listed above11. Having invested such large amount of capital for the license, liberalisation of spectrum may have a detrimental effect on the ability of the network operators to recover their investments12. Also, mobile virtual network operators such as Tesco who provide its services by utilizing spare spectrum capacity on O2’s network may suffer consequences as the amount of spectrum available to them will be reduced13.

Termination Rates; network providers charge each other a fee known as the termination charge for receiving a phone call on its network. This charge is pushed on to the consumer who eventually pays. In the past, these rates have been high and variable amongst different MNOs as well as a high source of revenue for MNOs. MNOs attributed the high and variable rates to factors such as costs for infrastructure.

The European Commission (EC) however expressed concerns about what it considered unjustifiable rates and therefore called for charges to be slashed14. Ofcom on the 6th of April 2009 directed that rates be reduced by 21%, and a further reduction to follow in 2010 with an aim to equalise all rates15. 3. 14 Base Stations ; Human Health; member of the general public as well as interest groups such as Powerwatch and Friends of the Earth Scotland have shown concern about impact of radiations from base stations, transmitters and mobile phones on human health.

According to the mobile operations association (MOA), all mobile phone base stations in use in the UK, comply with the international health and safety public exposure guidelines recommended by the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection. It also states that over 30 scientific researches has been conducted and results have shown no negative correlation between mobile phone base stations which comply with the international health and safety guidelines and human health16,17.

Wi-Fi is great, when it works. When it doesn’t, you’re often stuck buying a new router, or even worse, dragging out the old, unsightly Ethernet cord from the basement.

People who administer commercial Wi-Fi networks have the same problem, only their  are much more expensive and the wired alternative just as impractical. But thanks to new research from MIT, they might soon be able to more easily solve their Wi-Fi woes.

MIT engineers have come up with a way to change a router’s traffic management algorithms, which prioritize different types of data traveling over a network, without replacing the entire device. Their findings could make wireless routers reliable and cost-effective enough to be deployed in data centers, potentially revolutionizing the way servers talk to each other.

It’s already possible to change a router’s traffic management — it can even be done on your home router with a simple firmware update. But programmable traffic can’t stand up to the immense data transfer needs of a server farm.

“Previously, programmability was achievable, but nobody would use it in production, because it was a factor of 10 or even 100 slower,” MIT professor Hari Balakrishnan . So his team came up with a new type of scheduler, the part of a circuit that arranges data packets in the router’s queue and extracts them for forwarding.

Such a scheduler could serve as the foundation for a next-generation network switch that would allow data center managers to change how their network functions each time advances in scheduling technology are made, without having to replace the expensive routers themselves.

Switching to wireless routers from the wired type traditionally used in server farms could also simplify their layouts by removing the need to run miles of cable around a building. That could result in further cost savings.

One hopes those savings would be passed on to you, the Netflix, Dropbox or other cloud service customer, instead of being used to pad the company’s profits.

In this essay I will be looking at two adverts. One from the television and another from the radio. They are both the same advert from RSPCA’s “swim”. I will give a balanced discussion of the television and radios advertise. I will discuss the strength and weaknesses of both radio and television advert. I will consider the way language has been used to create effects. The way each media form was used effectively. How the charecterisation of the dog was created. The aim of this essay is to compare and contrast the radio and television versions of the RSPCA advert “swim”.

In order to create a successful advertisement, radio advertisers use different techniques. This involves; the average length of an advert; the types of adverts found on radio; the different styles of advert and the way the language used in the advert tries to attract the target audience. The average length of an advert is important, because if the advert is too long radio listeners may tune into another station because the advert is long and boring, but if the advert is short and sweet (short and simple), then people tend to like it. Average adverts are mainly thirty seconds long.

Note that when you listen to adverts on the radio the long adverts are important, and the short adverts are not that necessarily as serious. The types of adverts found on radio are important because they want to make sure that it isn’t an advert that is selling something, like cars or videos. They also have to make sure that it is unusual and that it is different from all other adverts so that people will listen to it. I have come across so many different radio adverts. They are mainly product, services and information adverts. Product adverts are like adverts to sell videos, games, and food etc. service adverts are like banks giving loans or a supermarket introducing home insurance. Information adverts are like congestion charges, mainly something to do with the government.

The way language used in adverts to attract the target audience is the vital piece, because if this wasn’t there then nobody will listen to the advert. If the advert is for kids then this is where diegetic sound comes in. diegetic sound is used in every advert that I have heard. Take “The Simpson’s” advert for example, we can tell that it is for Simpson lovers and kids because the use of diegetic sounds. In the advert they put the Simpson’s theme tune in, sounds of a fight scene. Nearly quotes of the video that they are selling. That is how they attract the target audience, by using diegetic sound.

RSPCA broadcasts a group of 3 adverts. I will be looking at the second advert “SWIM”. This advert gets increasingly shocking, because the first advert is a drive, which is when a dog gets run over by a car. The second advert is swim, when a dog gets put in a sack and then thrown in the canal by it’s owner. The third is injection, when the owner takes the dog to the vets to put the dog down. The advert grabs the audience’s attention by just using one voice, which is the dog. There is no diegetic sound, because without it the advert is powerful. The advert grabs the attention of the audience by using pathos. Pathos means, sympathy to the dog due to their greater understanding of the event. This comes in when the dog gets put in the sack. It is here where the audience knows that the dog is going to die.

At the end of the advert there is a woman voice over, it is well known that when a women does a voice over most people tend to listen. The advert has got no fancy sound track, that’s what makes it more appealing. When there is an advert on the radio, most people just tend to listen to the soundtrack that is being played, and at the end they try to think what the advert was trying to say, but the RSPCA advert “SWIM” only has one voice, the dog. This is done so that people just listen to what the dog is saying, and trying to concentrate on what the dog is trying to mean. After the dog it is followed by the female voice over, which makes it a strong issue.

We feel sympathy for the dog in the advert because of the way the narrator for the dog uses language. In the advert the dog is all happy because he is going for a walk with his owner and his brother, but things slightly go wrong, as the dogs are forced in the sack and then ready to be chucked in the river by their owner, “our best puts us in a sack”. The character of the dog is revealed to us by the use of language. It is hard to believe that a dog is talking, because it is the voice of a man, but when you keep on listening you figure out that it is a dog. It would’ve been hard to figure out that it was a dog if they didn’t think like one, because dogs in cartoons call their owners “best friend”.

We re made to feel that the owner is powerful through the dogs use of language, because in the advert the dog say’s “we are going for a swim”, which means that the owner is taking them for a swim; this assumes that the owner is powerful. There are many devices used to make the audience have an emotional response. One of the devices is to put the dogs in danger. When the dogs are in danger the audience will feel pity and anger. The length of the advert does affect our reaction, because it is kind of long which makes it boring, then people just switch off, but if this advert got the target audience then it doesn’t really matter.

In this advert there is direct appeal. This appeal is at the end of the advert where the lady says the slogan. “If you give a DAMN, don’t give a pet”. This is direct because in the slogan the RSPCA use the word DAMN. If they didn’t care then they would use some other word then they would use some other word instead of damn. The advert would sound something like this; if you care don’t, don’t give pet. That sounds like it isn’t that big of deal, but the fact that they used damn makes it more direct and appealing.

Marks and Spencer, which is also commonly known as “Marks and Sparks” or “M & S” first came into the limelight in the 20th century and had a policy of selling only British-made products. It made real in-roads by getting into a fruitful and long relationship with British manufacturers and selling food and clothes under the brand name of “St Michael”. It has more than 895 stores which cover more than 40 territories around the world. 600 of these stores are domestic while 285 are international ones.

Marks & Spencer also happens to be the largest clothing retailer in the UK. It is the 43rd largest retailer in the world. Most of its stores sell both food and clothing items. It has also started to expand into other products like homewares and furniture. What is RFID? Radio Frequency (RFID) technology isn’t exactly a new technology and has been around (in use) since the 1940’s. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has been in use since the 1940’s by the US military to distinguish friendly aircraft from enemy aircrafts (Mayfield 2002).

It has been in commercial use since the early 1980’s (Jones et al 2004) Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is the generic name to technologies that uses radio waves to identify items ( Jones et al 2004) It is a small tag containing integrated circuit chip and an antenna and has the ability to respond to radio waves transmitted from the radio in order to send, process and store information (wu et al 2005)

The RDID technology mainly consists of three basic components a tag a reader and a computer (wu et al 2005) The tag contains a unique identification of the product to which it is attached to, the reader emits and receives radio waves to read the information that is stored in the tag and the computer processes all the data that is collected (Attaran 2007, Wu et al 2005). We know that environment has a wide range of effects over any organisation’s performance.

Factors such as, competition, global economy, social changes and changes in technology impact the performance of any organisation and makes the overall environment more complex and uncertain. Before discussing the technology in use, the PEST analysis of Marks ; Spencer would be very important. PEST Analysis By doing the Pest analysis, we can explore the external macro environment that effects an organisation. These factors are categorized as political, economical socio-cultural and technological (See Appendix. 1). Technological

Today’s word is indeed a world of technological change. Almost all the large players in UK’s retail industry are aware of its importance. Marks ; Spencer has specifically invested a lot in MIS to improve its supply-chain and operations. The technology I have chosen to write about has the potential to change our ways of life, entirely. It has a very wide range of implications and could revolutionize a number of fields, including access management, human identification, toll collection and logistics. The technology is called RFID (Radio Frequency Identification).

The RFID technology has been around for quite a while however lately it is been inducted in a wide range of activities. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has been in use since the 1940’s by the US military to distinguish friendly aircraft from enemy aircrafts (Mayfield 2002) It has been in commercial use since the early 1980’s (Jones et al 2004). My focus shall remain on the implication of RFID technology in the retail industry and the organisation I have chosen to write about is “Marks & Spencer’.

Marks & Spencer had a technical trial of RFID technology in the advent of 2003 and later they started over a pilot site in 2004. The initial results were indeed successful according to James Stafford, technical executive of the Marks & Spencer, intellectual property. In February, 2004 he said: “We are very pleased with the results of the trial. It has proved that the technology works and that it has a contribution to make, but we still have work to do on the business case and the implementation costs,” says James Stafford, technical executive of the Marks & Spencer’s intellectual property.

” (BBC. com) Later, they expanded their onsite testing of the RFID technology to 42 of its stores, which covered around 6 of its product areas. The RFID tags are supplied to Marks ; Spencer by Paxar Corporation. The chips used in these tags are made by Swatch subsidiary EM Microelectronics, which is based in Switzerland. These tags are UHF, 64-bit, 868 MHZ and are encoded with an identifier which is linked with a unique catalog number. These RFID tags are used to track menswear by using RFID readers which store information into the inventory.

The RFID technology can read a whole cage or trolley of products at the same time (Mayfield 2002) Hence the RFID technology would enable remote accessing and edition of information over the items without consultation into a central database or replacement of labels providing in-depth information on stock and enabling the pertinent people (supplier or employees in store) to read and dispatch information, six or seven times faster than before.

As the matter of fact, it involves very little human involvement and offers many advantages. The ability to track inventory inside and outside of the store is also an advantage as it reduces staff theft and shop lifting (Hingley 2007) This efficient technology optimizes inventory management; improved order forecasts and eases distribution for a massive 350 million garments, which are moved into the Mark ; Spencer stores, each year.