BELGIUM: EPCglobal Inc, a subsidiary of the global not-for-profit supply-chain-standards organization GS1 has announced that Microsoft BizTalk RFID has been certified and is fully compliant with the organization's EPCIS standard for event generation.

The EPCIS (Electronic Product Code Information Services) standard allows for the seamless, secure capture and exchange of data at every point in the lifecycle of goods and services.

By providing a standard set of interfaces for EPC data, EPCIS enables a single way to capture and share information, while still allowing the flexibility for industry and organization-specific implementations said the press release.

"Microsoft has been a leader in adopting open standards in its RFID application platform," said Nicholas Fergusson, director of the Certification Program at EPCglobal Inc.

"Microsoft BizTalk RFID object event generation complies fully with the EPCIS standard, which means it can be used by enterprises to securely and efficiently capture event data which can then be shared with trading partners who are also using EPCIS-compliant solutions," added Fergusson.

"Microsoft BizTalk Server 2009 provides a low cost, enterprise ready, scaleable RFID application platform that spans from mobile devices to personal computers to servers," said Sudhir Hasbe, Senior Product Manager of BizTalk Server at Microsoft Corporation

The EPCIS standard was ratified in April 2007 and conformance testing began in September 2007. To be certified as EPCIS-compliant, a solution must pass a battery of tests that target a set of interfaces defined in the EPCIS standard. These tests include HTTP Capture Application, HTTP Capture Server, Query Control over HTTP, Query Callback to HTTP, and HTTPs destinations. Testing is conducted on EPCglobal's behalf by an independent company, MetLabs.