RFID in Japan

"Oribie Navi Land" is a GPS school bag for tracking kids. Japanese school bag manufacturer Kyowa and security systems and services company Secom are collaborating to release this product+service package this November.

Secom's GPS tracking device is called "KoKo Secom Communication Terminal" and attached to a side of a school bag to send realtime location information to Secom's server computer. The device is like a GPS-chipped cell phone except that one cannot talk with this device.

Parents can check their child's whereabouts by either making a phone call to Secom's service center or accessing a website using a PC or a smart phone. Parents can ask Secom's security agents to go rescue their children in case of possible emergency.

Secom started a tracking service for humans and cars, which is called KoKo Secom, in 2001. "Oribie Navi Land" appears to be very similar to KoKo Secom. Currently there are 213,000 subscribers of KoKo Secom Service and the company says a few thousand lost elderly persons were found using KoKo Secom.

The divice is fairly lightweight - just 48 grams including a battery that lasts about a week. However, it would be the case that users might want to charge the device every night.

"Oribie Navi Land" will be available on November 1 at the 63 company stores and other department stores across the nation. The bag including the device costs 33,000 Japanese Yen (about US$300). A monthly service fee is 800 JPY (about US$7.5)

via ITMedia, October 27, 2004, in Japanese.

Posted by konomi at October 28, 2004 09:53 PM | TrackBack