Technology developer Wiliot has officially joined the Advisory Board of the Auburn University RFID Lab, a prominent research facility dedicated to advancing radio-frequency identification and related sensor technologies. This strategic move shows the importance of connected supply-chain systems, where continuous sensing and ambient intelligence are becoming integral to operational visibility and automation.
The Auburn University RFID Lab, based within Auburn University, has more than two decades of experience in collaborating with industry, academia and standards bodies to explore RFID, sensor networks and internet-of-things (IoT) solutions across sectors ranging from retail to aerospace. The Lab’s advisory board now includes over 30 companies spanning the technology and end-user ecosystem, and Wiliot’s addition strengthens its focus on ambient IoT, battery-free sensors and data-rich analytics.
Wiliot will be represented on the advisory board by Amir Khoshniyati, Head of Strategy & Business Development, which emphasises the company’s intention to shape next-generation standards and frameworks for item-level intelligence in supply chains. In a statement, Wiliot highlighted that while RFID has provided event-based visibility (such as a scan at a checkpoint), ambient IoT delivers continuous, sensor-rich data streaming from objects that can monitor motion, condition, location and environment in real time.
In practical terms, this collaboration suggests a future in which RFID and ambient IoT systems are not viewed as competing technologies but as complementary layers, RFID covering high-speed event recognition and ambient IoT supplying ongoing contextual intelligence. Wiliot’s vision is that every product or asset becomes a node in a living network, streaming intelligence that feeds machine learning and AI systems for quicker, smarter decision-making.
From an industry perspective, the appointment is significant. Supply-chain managers, logistics operators and asset-tracking professionals recognise that the next frontier lies not only in knowing where things are, but understanding how they are behaving and whether they meet quality or compliance expectations. By joining the Advisory Board, Wiliot gains access to a research ecosystem that can test, validate and refine ambient IoT and sensor-enabled visibility methods in collaboration with academia and other industrial players.
For Wiliot, the move aligns with its existing deployments with major partners, where millions of IoT Pixels have already been used in retail, logistics and cold-chain monitoring. The collaboration with Auburn University’s RFID Lab is expected to facilitate further integration of ambient IoT into academic research, standards-development projects and field trials, paving the way for broader adoption across industries.
Wiliot’s inclusion on the Auburn University RFID Lab Advisory Board shows how the industry is thinking about supply-chain visibility: from periodic scans and checkpoints to continuous sensing and ambient awareness. As organisations strive for greater automation, real-time analytics and condition-based oversight, the combination of RFID, Bluetooth Low Energy sensors and ambient IoT becomes a compelling architecture for the future.