IUID Blog

If the military recognizes the huge return on investment (ROI) of UID, it stands to reason that contractors who are implementing UID should be able to reap similar benefits on a smaller scale. It’s time to get creative and put those UID’s to work. Here’s what the DoD has discovered:  (Read More)

This Q&A-style article in the Providence Business News addresses 5 questions that cover: (Read More)

Recent changes to all property bearing contracts administrated by the DCMA are having an effect on government furnished property (GFP) property managers. There is movement away from high level aggregate reporting of government property (GFP) TOWARD item specific reporting that falls in line with DFARS 252.211-7007. This is illustrated by the Jan 11, 2010 Memorandum from Director, Defense Procurement and Acquisition Policy (DPAP) Shay Assad in which he calls upon the Directors of virtually all DoD procurement and contracts agencies to formulate a detailed set of milestones for IUID implementation within six months. (Read More)

In follow up to a former blog entry (A2B Hosts User Group Meeting), I’d like to share insights from the meeting in San Antonio.  With over 50 people participating, A2B led the discussion about our products and services roadmap.  Part of our goal was to generate discussion throughout the community of UID Comply!® software users and part of the goal was to share challenges that we were anticipating and starting to address for that community of users.  For instance, we recognize that not everything can be solved with technology.  Sometimes the community just needs down and dirty support in navigating UID policy issues. That’s why we’ve introduced A2B’s free new service to Premium-One™ support customers  - the UID Coach™. (Read More)

Although the DoD and the UID policy office have achieved significant momentum in implementing UID, there are still plenty of hurdles to overcome. One of them is bad UIDs. I’m not talking about choosing the wrong barcode symbology. I’m not talking about the quality of the UID 2D Data Matrix image. I’m talking about encoding to MIL-STD-130. (Read More)

I don’t mean to be overly simplistic but these questions frame the challenges that we see every day as the US military rolls out their UID policy to track valuable DoD assets and equipment around the world.  Every day we receive phone calls or meet people at conferences and they ask the same question: What items do I need to mark?  Of course, they typically are asking what the DoD’s policy dictates, but I believe that definition is far too narrow as it only begins the analysis of what  in your custody or area of responsibility MUST be marked.  (Read More)

It’s been a busy start to the year already.  A few of the notable activities going on at A2B as we roll into the month of February: (Read More)

Last week in Phoenix AZ, at the DoD Maintenance Symposium, I was fortunate to hear General Ann Dunwoody, Commanding General of US Army Materiel Command.  She inspired the audience with a call to action, namely to consider the reality for the US military in light of a future with a significant budget deficit.  In short, that means less money to support the war fighter. (Read More)

We just returned from visiting a major US Air Force base where we were amazed by the diverse categories of equipment that require an UID mark.  So many different surfaces and conditions challenge the marking effort.  For example, some conditions require that adhesives bond to a surface temperature up to 160° F. Other conditions required a material that could handle being covered in jet fuel.  Remember that the UID has to last the life of that item, once it’s applied. (Read More)

We had some feedback, following our most recent UID Web Seminar that clearly illustrates the importance of tackling UID with a team approach. One attendee wrote, “Please accept our thanks and appreciation to both A2B and David (Collins of Data Capture Institute) for bringing us an informative hour that was well spent. Everyone on our team sat together, property management, purchasing, operations and executive departments, up to and including our president. We heard as one the inevitability of moving ahead with UID.”  (Read More)