VDC Research analyst Drew Nathanson certain does. Check out the comments below from this week’s blog about RFID and the retail sector. It appears the time has come for RFID, with transponder volumes in retail exceeding 2 billion units by 2014.

From Drew’s blog:

“Back in the early days of RFID, in particular the beginnings of the EPC market, it was easy for the RFID community to perceive that the market was evolving much faster than it actually was due to highly pervasive media hype, rogue evangelism, a continued stream of account win announcements and an overselling campaign of the technology’s value proposition and business models. My mantra during those years was simply, “Don’t Believe the Hype.” The reality of the situation was that the RFID industry was still embryonic and not quite ready to live up to the image the media created.

We are in another round of hype and evangelism, but this time, it appears to be real. I’m specifically talking about the retail market for RFID. I’m a conservative analyst that invokes a logical, primary research dependent process to develop highly reliable estimates and forecasts. The only time I deviate from my conservative approach is when there is significant evidence that supports it…now is one of those times.”