Development of an Automated Laboratory Assets Inventory Control With Security System

This study is the development of an automated laboratory asset with an inventory system and security features using passive Radio Frequency ID (RFID). The RFID, in combination with bar code, is used to log-in and log- out borrowed equipment during laboratory and non-laboratory classes or even during research class. With the automated system, the dispensing process is reduced. A real-time inventory of equipment, as well as utilization reports, is easily generated and accessed by the authorized personnel. From the manual system with a cycle time process of 15.45 minutes for dispensing of equipment, the dispensing time was reduced to 2.92 minutes, and 5.17 minutes of returning of equipment to 4.54 minutes, which are 81.10% and 12.19% improvement respectively. The inventory report that requires a day to prepare generated in a minute. A user-interface survey was deployed to the students to determine the acceptability of the system. Sixty respondents had high acceptability in terms of user-interface, perceived usefulness, and perceived ease of use. The system has been tested for three semesters now in the Engineering Laboratory.