Heard on the street: "small is the new big" and "miniaturization, miniaturization, miniaturization."

Actually, that was not heard on the street. It was heard at the CA World conference in Las Vegas.

Yogesh Gupta, the Chief Technology Officer of CA (Computer Associates), says the most important technologies next year are going to be the smallest. One of those technologies that he refers to is radio frequency identification (RFID) chips. CA even went so far as to add an RFID chip to every attendee badge at CA World. You can read more in the story at Silicon.com.

I note this article because it is indicative of the kind of expectations for RFID we can expect to see a lot more of. The excitement is building, and 2006 should be an interesting year for RFID.

We have come a long way these past couple of years since RFID started entering the business community's and public's consciousness with a vengeance.

Gen 2 is a done deal, bringing clarity to the standards for usage in supply chain and distribution implementations. Vendors, consultants and integrators have gotten more experience under their belts with pilots and limited roll-outs. Tag prices have dropped. Everyone has learned more about the boundaries of privacy issues. Plans are moving forward on many fronts, in many industries, applying RFID in many different ways.

We have been in the trough of disillusionment with RFID. It is still early days, but as we start to come out of it, this time around the expectations will be tinged with realism and everyone will approach it armed with much more knowledge.