David C. Wyld is the Mayfield Professor of Management and is the Director of Strategic e-Commerce Initiative at Southeastern Louisiana University.

Earlier this month in Washington, DC, over 1000 representatives from the military and the contracting community gathered for the third DOD (Department of Defense) RFID Summit for Industry. The U.S. military is undertaking a massive transformation of its logistics operations, and RFID is a key component of this global effort. Its RFID mandate reaches further than that of any retailer, as of most of the approximately suppliers employ from 1 to 4 people. This month the DOD began supplier shipments in four categories of material to two of its distribution centers, located in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania and San Joacquin, California.

The conference was a great forum for uniformed and civilian military personnel and the contracting community to both share lessons learned from initial implementation of the Defense Department mandate and exchange information on the technical and cultural challenges that lay ahead. Throughout the two days of presentations and panel discussions, one thing is clear: The Defense Department’s RFID efforts are being carried out for one customer, the U.S. soldier, sailor or airman – in DOD parlance, the “warfighter.”