Press
Press
ECHORFID PIPETALKER WHITE PAPER
June, 2020 - Layne Tucker, EchoRFID LLC, USA, introduces an EchoRFID White Paper describing PipeTalker, a traceable, verifiable and complete asset intellegence for field staff.
ECHORFID FEATURED IN WORLD PIPELINE MAGAZINE
November, 2018 - Steve Slusarenko, ProStar Geocorp Inc., USA, and Layne Tucker, EchoRFID LLC, USA, explain why RFID is a critical technology for the oil and gas industry.
Read more here in World Pipeline Magazine
ECHORFID FEATURED IN WORLD PIPELINE MAGAZINE
December, 2017 - Steve Slusarenko (ProStar Geocorp Inc., USA) and Layne Tucker (EchoRFID LLC and ProStar Geocorp Inc., USA) explore ways of using RFID to track, trace and verify to meet pipeline regulation compliance requirements.
Read more here in World Pipeline Magazine
ECHORFID FEATURED IN AMERICAN LOCATE MAGAZINE
November 13, 2017 - Layne Tucker had a vision for the standardization of material tracking,traceability and verification for oil, gas and other utility assets on a global level. He spent a decade assembling industry veterans and technology experts to develop a global system for a full life cycle cradle to the grave process for material and construction task management to include integrity data retention in real time georeferenced. In this data chain of custody of “What, Who, When, and Where,” all components throughout the system can be traced above or below ground. It all must begin with electronic management of material manufacturing information conjoined with construction, RFID tag and task qualification in real-time with built-in business rules.
Read more here in American Locate Magazine
GEOLOCATION, RFID COMPANIES SELLING SYSTEM FOR PIPE AND EQUIPMENT TRACKING
September 04, 2017 - Colorado-based ProStar Geocorp has teamed up with its sister company, EchoRFID, to create an RFID-enabled solution to manage the locations and status of utility assets, such as pipes, drills and heavy equipment. The system combines ProStar's Transparent Earth geospatial locating platform, its GPS-based PointMan mobile app, and EchoRFID's read- and write-management solution, known as Pipe Talker. The two companies are currently in discussions with several oil and gas and utility businesses to begin piloting or deploying the holistic solution to manage the movements of pipeline materials to and around worksites, and to track them for maintenance purposes after each pipe piece is installed.
ProStar launched Transparent Earth, its software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution, five years ago after spending about a decade in research and development, as well as registering for patents. Layne Tucker, ProStar's co-founder and EchoRFID's founder and CEO, came up with the concept in 2002 when a gas pipeline in Northern Alberta was accidentally struck during a construction project. That incident started him wondering how such mistakes could be prevented. Tucker spent several years researching and developing a solution, and ProStar was the result.
Read more here at RFID Journal or download a PDF here
PROSTAR GEOCORP ANNOUNCES IT HAS COMPLETED THE INTEGRATION OF ITS POINTMAN® MOBILE SOLUTION WITH ECHORFID'S PIPETALKER™
July 27, 2017 - Grand Junction, Colorado. ProStar Geocorp announced today that it has integrated its mobile platform, PointMan® with EchoRFID's PIPETALKER™, a menu-driven software tool that uses patented processes to track and trace materials and assets by reading radio frequency identification (RFID) tags. PointMan is specifically designed to collect precision location points and pedigreed 'metadata' associated to those points, including forms, photos and sketches. The PIPETALKER system incorporates RFID, highly accurate GPS and other data for compliance with PHMSA's Pipeline Integrity Management requirements.
“With this new ability to accurately track, trace and verify material right from the manufacturing plant and record value-added tasks of employees and contractors, PointMan enhanced with PIPETALKER will show great cost benefits, significant return on investment and lower risk while maintaining full PHMSA and DOT compliance," says EchoRFID’s founder, Layne Tucker.
Read more here at PRWEB
EVOLVING TO MEET THE CHALLENGES OF THE DATA REVOLUTION - American Locator Magazine
Every leap in technology starts with an “Aha!” moment. For the EchoRFID/ProStar solution, this moment was in 2002 while a contractor was ditching for a new pipeline in Northern Alberta and struck an unmarked, unmapped, gathering gas pipeline, resulting in the job being shut down. Layne Tucker, now the CEO of EchoRFID, on hearing of this incident, and being in the pipeline construction business himself as an owner, started thinking of how these types of incidents may be avoided. He wondered how new technologies like GPS Navigation Systems and tablet computers might be leveraged to assist in preventing accidents like this. The “Aha!” came when he realized that the navigation system in his truck that displayed his position on a road map, could just as well display a network of pipelines instead of roads.
Read more here at The American Locator Magazine
ECHORFID OBTAINED US PATENT PROTECTION FOR ITS UTILITY ASSETS QUALITY CONTROL PROCESS AND AUDIT SYSTEMS
EchoRFID is pleased to announce it has been awarded a patent for its “system and method for quality control, inspection and audit of utility assets” utilizing RFID tags. This adds significant value to EchoRFID’s current patent portfolio. The invention is a process for capturing, organizing and retrieving data related to utility assets. By using programmed RFID tags placed directly on the asset, companies can manage data for the abundance of utilities above and below ground. This process includes storing detailed critical information about utility assets including location, segment identification, repairs, maintenance documentation, testing validation, inspection and material certifications. The unique EchoRFID method also includes query retrieval of data stored using the unique identifier corresponding with one or more RFID tags. “Having this patent issued is a significant milestone for EchoRFID as well as our PIPETALKER® product,” said Layne Tucker, CEO and Founder of EchoRFID. “This patent protects our unique processes including how PIPETALKER provides materials, traceability, construction management and access to asset lifecycle records after initial construction.”
Read more about EchoRFID's Patent here at The PRWEB 
REPORTING ON THE RFID SOLUTION - World Pipeline Magazine - September 2016
Today we are all very much aware of the increased visibility of the oil and gas industry in the news. Via printed media, television and the internet, the press reports every incident, making the public acutely aware of every negative event. As a result, the public has become very vocal and more involved in the regulatory approval process.
Steve Slusarenko (ProStar Geocorp Inc, Canada, Steve Soychak (SJKS Ventures, USA) and Layne Tucker (EchoRFID, USA) outline how RFID technology contributes to pipeline safety, regulatory compliance and the bottom line.
Read more 'Reporting on the RFID Solution here in The World Pipeline Magazine
GROUND CONTROL - RFID Journal - March/April 2016
Cities and towns worldwide are populated with a wide variety of cables, pipes and poles that supply us with electricity, gas and water. These assets, made of concrete, metal, plastic or wood, reside above and below ground. Every day, workers spend hours in the field inspecting the integrity of these items, doing essential maintenance and repairs, and ensuring other utility or construction firms working in the vicinity don't accidentally damage them. Much of that time is spent locating the assets and manually updating records. RFID can help utitlity companies save time and money by speeding their ability to locate and identify assets, thereby facilitating inspections and services.
Read more 'Ground Control' here in RFID Journal
NEW TECHNOLOGIES PRESENT OPPORTUNITIES FOR PIPELINE ASSET MANAGERS
- Inspectioneering Journal - January/Febuary 2016
Everyone in the Oil & Gas Industry knows that we are in the business of moving product from the ground to the consumer. This is a very complex process that requires many events to happen in the right place, at the right time, and in the right way. Many of these events involve numerous people, each potentially with different desires, needs, and opinions. It can be a very risky and costly process. Layne Tucker, Steve Slusarenko and Jim Anspach discuss the advances in technology and how they have presented the Oil & Gas Industry a new set of tools to provide improved management and access to critical information throughout the enterprise.
Read more 'New Technologies' here in Inspectioneering Journal
LEVERAGING RFID TECHNOLOGIES FOR PIPELINE ASSET MANAGEMENT
- Inspectioneering Journal - January/Febuary 2016
Emerging technologies, including Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), are readily available to be utilized to improve oil and gas pipeline asset management business processes. RFID in particular continues to help industry leaders with identification and compliance in the Energy space. The old days of using banding, bar coding, and ball peening numbers and colors have been greatly improved with the introduction of advanced RFID technology. These old technologies that are still used today however, continue to be time consuming and are prone to errors in data collection. Additionally, in the Energy space the tools and assets used are in a very rough and dirt filled environment, making the collection of the data even more difficult. RFID technology benefits from the ability to identify an item without line of site and acquire the part information in a matter of seconds. This creates a positive means to identify the part/tool, as well as the ability to record and update local and enterprise systems at the same time.
Read more 'Leveraging RFID Technologies' here in Inspectioneering Journal