Does your business use labeling or bar codes? What about radio frequency identification (RFID) or inventory management?
If so, you may want to keep up with what’s going on in the automatic identification and data capture (AIDC) industry.
Let’s talk about market trends shaking up AIDC these days.
Market volatility
The challenging economy still plays a partial role in spending habits of several companies. It’s affecting overall performance and growth expectations.
The good news is that the market is finally showing some signs of recovery. Bigger players are starting to eat up the little guys. Also, the practice of having one partner for everything—versus little shops here and there—is becoming more popular. From an industry perspective, people are growing optimistic about 2014.
2D bar coding
In a recent blog post about 2D bar coding, I talk about how this technology has surpassed expectations of nearly everyone. In 2013, 2D imagers grew 30 percent. Meanwhile, laser scanners are showing a steady decline.
AIDC prices
With the merging of larger parent companies, pricing structures are starting to become less competitive. Vendors and partners still lower prices to keep clients, but it’s getting more difficult. On a positive note, manufacturing is starting to move back to the states. Off-shoring is becoming less of a fad.
Consumer or rugged devices?
Now to tackle the big elephant in the room: consumer devices versus rugged for enterprise work. The benefits of going rugged are becoming apparent. Experts point out that rugged mobile computers are less expensive in the long run, considering the higher failure rate, device availability, change management and other problems related to consumer gear.
In these articles, I explain why rugged devices outshine consumer options in the enterprise space:
Rugged Mobile Computers vs. Consumer Computers: The debate continues
How I learned the benefits of rugged devices the hard way
Want to know more about AIDC technology? Curious about market trends in data capture and bar coding? Check out these free AIDC research tools.
Have you noticed any other emerging market trends in labeling, RFID, data collection, and bar code systems? Go ahead and share your observations below.
