In the IT and telecommunications industry’s supply chain, packages may contain many products. These products often consist of components which may also be relevant for tracking & tracing (e.g. bundles or modules/ boards as preconfigured “assembled products”).
Automatic data capture infrastructure already in place normally is not used for the capturing of those hierarchical structures as bar codes mostly are used to identify the type and instance of the bundle/assembled product.
This guideline defines how to encode multiple product information into a high capacity media (e.g. 2D symbols or RFID tags) in a hierarchical and structured way. It enables tracking of assets on a type and instance level even for hierarchically structured products while fully relying on established ISO/ ANSI standards.

Transparency of the supply chain helps to minimize capital and operational expenditure by enabling the business to know where purchased assets are within the supply chain. Depending on the level of detail used with the definition of assets, it is important to know the details of products and components not only on a type level but also on an instance level. To minimize uncertainty on where assets are within the supply chain, material information should be captured as soon as it enters the company’s goods receipt and should be fed into the relevant IT Systems. This also helps when taking inventory into account for goods still on the road or on the installation site and reduces undesired loss of materials.
Most businesses therefore already employ automatic data capture (ADC) technologies and count on standardized processes and structures. When capturing product and instance data, usually automatic capturing technologies like bar codes, 2D symbols and/ or RFID are used.

In the IT and telecommunications industry packages may contain many products. These products often consist of components which may also be relevant for tracking & tracing.
As of the development of this guideline, ADC infrastructure already in place normally is not used for the capturing of those hierarchical structures as bar codes mostly are used to identify the type and instance of the bundle/assembled product. Transmission of the data is instead done via electronic data exchange and/or printed documents sent with (attached to) the product package. Additionally transmitting the information about the content of packages as part of the package marking would enable identification of the content of the package using ADC technologies, as a complement to existing solutions (i.e. EDI and paper).

To enable fast capture of the type and instance identification of a hierarchical structured product without opening the package or correlating electronically received data, this document defines how to encode multiple product information in a high capacity media (e.g. 2D symbols or RFID tags), in a hierarchical and structured way. The capability of automatic identification of the content in a package supports the goods receiving, warehousing, inventory management and redistribution processes. Using this specification, the Lifecycle Management can be extended from products down to components of products. The components can be imported into relevant systems and tracked on a type and instance level.

The labeling guideline primarily refers to the labeling of product packages. For transport and shipment labeling see EDIFICE Shipment Label Guideline Issue 5.