RFID enabled N tier Clinical Inventory Management System

Executive Summary

Our customer is a leading US-based space saving solution provider to the US market that saves space.

Our customer was not having engineering expertise to execute the project so they approached us to leverage our expertise in executing the project. eInfochips has developed certain key modules that would redefine usage of the customer's software and increasingly enhance security, networking, remote access and full automation of the inventory management software.

eInfochips, with various technologies like Asp.Net, C# 3.5, Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008, AJAX, Microsoft Web service Factory, Microsoft Guidance Package, SQL Server 2005, developed this software. With an offshore development model we have reduced the project cost over 25%.

The Customer

Our customer has been providing space saving and productivity solutions to businesses throughout the US and active accounts which is nearly running for thirty years. Their commitment to service is evident by the customers they keep and the suppliers with whom they have special relationships.

They wanted to pass on full responsibility of the project including sustenance and maintenance to us and we had delightfully taken up the responsibility and executed the project successfully.

The Challenge

• In order to bridge the gap between learning and execution, eInfochips had to have an onsite-offshore model of implementation with 1 engineer onsite and 5 engineers at offshore development center.
• We had to complete the project as time to market was critical.

Design & Development

eInfochips has executed the project through the development of the following software modules:
Help:
This module enables users to view Current Release, Product demo, Company details and contacts, End User License Agreement, Statistics, System Information and Tutorials
Mail:
This feature enabled the communication between end-users and supports staff.
Organization Support Module:
This module is to facilitate user with organization related features like association and manipulation of child organization and profiles pertaining to organization. This also supports the staff who uses this module to Manage Organizations, Manage Profiles, Manage Security, Settings, Attributes, and Organization Contacts
Re-Order Report:
Once an item's on-hand quantity is less than or equal to the low per value assigned to it, the item appears on a reorder report for replenishment. This report will display an entire list of all items that are in need of ordering. From here, user can generate the purchase orders that can be sent to purchase department to procure the desired quantity.
Dynamic Main Menu:
Menus are dynamically generated from the database on the basis of roles assigned to the logged-in user.
Item Summary:
This feature displays Item details/summary and allows editing/updating Item Detail
RFID User Interface:
einfochips has developed an RFID system for our customer's software. Through this system, a microprocessor was placed within the customer's cart products which served as the clinical inventory scanned medical product's data through a chip that was placed within the medical product's wrapper. This data is then transmitted aerially through an antenna to a Web service and made available to the inventory management software. Using this control, a remote administrator could - Issuing Cart commands, (e.g. Lock/Unlock cart, Send finger print templates, Upgrade firmware), Lock/Unlock carts, View cart logs.
Web services:
Integrating RFID carts with the inventory management software through web services we enabled applications like: Inventory Log: Using RFID interface, cart would automatically update inventory log Cart Configuration:
Cart Commands
Fingerprint Templates:
Using this feature, only designated employees could gain access to cart contents. The cart would scan fingerprint of users and match with available templates to permit access.
Groups and Users:
Users can be created with assigned groups and groups can be created with roles. According to roles assigned to user, user has different security for a system.
Encounter Settings:
Using this feature user can create procedure and related categories, support staff and encounter rooms. User can also set different configuration parameters for encounters.
Scan List:
Allows adding, editing and deleting scan list (Groups of scanned items).
Reports:
offshore team has re-developed all the reports with new architecture and optimized queries because old reports were lacking with performance even though it is created with LINQ.
Testing:
eInfochips’ onsite Champion handled Unit Testing of Developed Modules before delivery to customer.
Sustenance:
eInfochips handled all sustenance activities like Bug Detection and Bug Fixing. So far eInfochips has enabled 4 successful releases and currently eInfochips is involved in adding further features to the product. eInfochips has fixed over 1500 bugs with new module development.

Technology

• Asp.Net
• C# 3.5
• Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008
• AJAX
• Microsoft Web service Factory
• Microsoft Guidance Package
• SQL Server 2005.

The Benefit

• With wider experience in medical software industry eInfochips has executed the project that reduced the project cost over 25%
• eInfochips’ onsite-offshore Service Model has greatly reduced the Project execution time and iterations in feature enhancements which helps customer to grasp higher market share.
• The highly complex Software architecture employed in the project was implemented to record time by our offshore team, subsequently, delivering product in time for release, in spite of being new to the tools and language.
• In the wake of late revelations by the customer about certain structural flaws in the specifications initially assigned, our offshore team has ramped up the operations in less than a month to deliver a new impeccable working model as acceptable in the market. This has saved our customer’s major losses and credibility/reliability.
• eInfochips’ embedded division co-partnered in introducing RFID operations in existing software, thus meeting end to end requirements cost effectively in less time frame since our team could internally transfer relevant and confidential project information and be in sync with the development.
• eInfochips is sustaining and maintaining product which enables the customer to concentrate on their core job and we have added four new features till date and are looking forward to add more to address the market needs.