The history of Savi:
savi.com
It all started with a lost 2-year-old.
Rob Reis' son wandered off in a grocery store. Rob found his son, and at the same time found the idea for the "Tagalong," a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag that could track lost children. He founded Savi Technology in 1989 and hired fellow engineer Vic Verma (who is now Savi's president & CEO) out of Stanford University to build the product.
But Savi never did tag any children. In 1990, the U.S. Department of Defense was preparing for war. In the hectic mobilization of materiel shipped to the Persian Gulf for Operation Desert Shield (later called Desert Storm), the Army shipped 40,000 containers to the Gulf, and then had to open up 25,000 of them to see what was inside. The Army estimated that if an effective way of tracking the location and content of the cargo containers - such as Savi's technology - had existed at that time, the DoD would have saved roughly $2 billion.*
In an effort to streamline its supply chain operations, the Defense Department awarded Savi (beating out several other major wireless communications companies) a $70 million contract in 1994, followed by a $112 million contract in 1997 to install its RFID hardware and software for item-level tracking in containers shipped to military installations around the world. In addition, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the creator of the Internet, has funded several Savi research initiatives to further its vision of creating the supply chain counterpart to the Internet through development of cutting-edge monitoring and optimization technologies.
Together, these programs have proven highly successful, with the DoD extending its contract in 2000 for another two years, reaffirming Savi's role as the sole RFID provider to the military. Today, Savi tracks more than 200,000 items for the military each year, from ammunition to spare parts.
Savi was acquired by Texas Instruments in 1995, and then sold to Raytheon Corporation in 1997. In May 1999, management and venture and corporate investors led the buyout of Savi from Raytheon and it again became a private company.
Today, Savi operates the world's largest real-time visibility network, with sea, air and land chokepoints throughout the United States, Asia and Europe. In fall 2000, the company launched its premier software platform, Savi SmartChain™, enabling end-to-end supply chain collaboration and intelligent event management, all based on accurate, real-time data from both traditional and state-of-the-art data collection technologies. Coupled with SmartChain application software, or interfaced to ERP or other enterprise software, the platform provides the foundation for any intra-enterprise or end-to-end supply chain management and security solution.
In April 2001 Savi expanded to Asia with the acquisition of AceFusion Pte Ltd., a Singapore-based provider of web-based, multi-modal supply chain execution solutions. The acquisition of AceFusion, now renamed to Savi Technology Asia, added more supply chain asset management and collaboration applications to Savi's real-time, automated tracking and security product line. The combined entity allows Savi to offer a software platform and applications to enable multi-national shippers, logistics services providers, conveyance owner, and infrastructure owners to monitor, manage, and secure the progress of goods through all segments of a global supply chain.
Recently, Savi launched EchoPointTM. EchoPoint is a RFID technology development platform upon which a full range of RFID products can be developed. With over 12 years of RFID experience, Savi developed EchoPoint with a unique multi-frequency design and three-element system architecture to achieve both reliable long-range communication and short-range locating capability, at an appealing price point . Savi EchoPoint technology is a completely new approach to solving the challenges of real-time, automated tracking through global supply chains.
Today, Savi is the proven leader in global supply chain security solutions and real-time asset management applications. |
