Savi said on April 9 the Defense Department has awarded it a potential five-year, $102 million winner-take-all contract to provide new capabilities to the department and its components for automatic global tracking and monitoring of assets and commodities.

Under the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-IV program, Savi will provide customers with a comprehensive array of hardware and software products including active RFID sensors, readers, Real-Time Location Systems, satellite communication, and related solutions for global asset planning and tracking of personnel, equipment and cargo sustainment worldwide.

Savi’s partners on the new contract include Orbcomm [ORBC], Austria’s Identec Solutions, Ubisense, Evanhoe & Associates, Northrop Grumman [NOC] and Honeywell [HON].

The contract was awarded by the Army’s Product Director Automated Movement and Identification Solutions (AMIS).

“RFID-IV is a crucial element to the AMIS vision of a DoD-wide enterprise that leverages identification and information technologies to enable efficient use of global asset planning and the movement and tracking of personnel, equipment and sustainment cargo from home station to destination and back,’ Jim Alexander, PD AMIS, said in a statement.

Savi is the only company that has been a prime contractor on the previous three RFID contracts, having won more than 97 percent of all awards totaling more than 61 percent of the combined $1 billion-plus ceiling. For RFID-III, Savi, Northrop Grumman [NOC], Unisys [UIS], and Systems & Processes Engineering Corp. have been the incumbents.

Separately April 9, Savi introduced nine new active RFID products including sensors, readers and portable deployment kits to allow customers establish a complete aRFID system.

“By combining the upgraded performance of Savi’s new sensors and hardware with our analytic applications, organizations can capture and convert their sensor data into operational intelligence to improve efficiency, reduce risk and more confidently manage their organization,” Bill Clark, Savi’s president and CEO, said in a statement.

The new sensors include one to detect theft or tampering of shipping containers, another to track shipments in real-time as they move through the global supply chain, an asset monitor to mount on pallets and rolling stock to better manage assets, and fixed and mobile readers.