Expert Insight: Guest Contribution
     
     
  April 29 , 2008  
 

Voice Picking Thought Leaders Discussion: The Rise of Voice Technology in Distribution

 
     
 

Hundreds of Proof Points and High ROI Drive Adoption, Vocollect's Larry Sweeney Says; Expect Marriage of Voice and RFID in Multi-Modal Deployments

 
     
 
Sweeney Says:
While order selection clearly remains the most popular and widespread use for voice, in the DC, it’s already being used for replenishment, putaway, line-loading, put-to-store, and there are also in-store applications. All of this extends the return on investment for companies.

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Supply Chain Digest’s Dan Gilmore recently spoke with Larry Sweeney, a co-founder of Vocollect and currently Vice President of Customer Advocacy for the voice technology leader, on several themes related to use of voice technology in distribution.

Gilmore: Voice technology is very hot right now.  What do you think have been the keys to the market taking off the way it has?

Sweeney: I’d say there are several things. Most importantly, voice now has a 20-year track record in well-documented success in improving productivity and performance and achieving rapid ROI. When Vocollect pioneered the use of voice in the DC, of course we had no idea it would become as widely used as it is today in so many industries and countries. The use of voice started in grocery, but it soon spread to retail, 3PL, pharmaceuticals, automotive…with this widespread acceptance, voice is now accepted as a viable and cost-effective performance tool in the supply chain arena. 

Another important variable is the globalization of voice. Our Vocollect Voice is now used by hundreds of thousands of workers in 31 countries on six continents. That’s pretty powerful validation. Finally, since choice and flexibility are important for many customers, voice can now be deployed on both dedicated and third party, multiple-use devices. With many manufacturers such as Psion Teklogix and Motorola expanding the use of voice on their multi-function devices, voice is expanding even more widely around the world through their customer bases.

Gilmore: What have been some of the most important recent developments in voice technology and devices?

Sweeney: The desire for maximum choice and flexibility in voice applications has created the need to have easier interfaces with service-oriented architecture (SOA).  Today’s IT groups expect any new technologies coming into their company to be fully compatible with their enterprises, and that not only makes the deployment easier and less costly, it reduces overall risk. So last year Vocollect introduced its Vocollect Voice Integration Platform, which is the foundation on which all of our future offerings will be built. Another concern is some companies want to maximize their investment and use devices that perform multiple functions. So voice companies must be able to operate their offerings on more than just dedicated voice devices

Gilmore: What can we expect to see over the next few years?

Sweeney: We believe that, more and more, companies will find voice outperforms other technologies such as pick-to-light, hands-down. We see voice being applied in more and more industries, such as our entering healthcare through our subsidiary Vocollect Healthcare Systems. And we’ve only scratched the surface. What about mobile workers who aren’t connected with a DC? They have a route they must service. What about certain office functions?  Retail store personnel?

Gilmore: Are you seeing much activity for voice outside of the order picking area that is the most common application?

Sweeney: While order selection clearly remains the most popular and widespread use for voice, in the DC, it’s already being used for replenishment, putaway, line-loading, put-to-store, and there are also in-store applications. All of this extends the return on investment for companies.

Gilmore: Do you see opportunity for combining voice with RFID?

Sweeney: We have some exciting, but proprietary, pilots going right now with major household name customers. Voice marries well with RFID, because RFID tells you a lot about the product, and voice tells you what to do with that product. So they are really complementary technologies. As you know, the big issue is commercial viability. It will take time for demand to heat up and drive the price down. But when that happens, voice and RFID will be a natural fit.

Gilmore: What’s the typical timeline for a voice project in distribution?

Sweeney: There are many variables – size of the operation, the number of DCs involved, the number of workers involved, whether they do dedicated work with voice or must perform multiple functions, whether the company is doing a full-blown implementation or starting in a small area…but we have documented multiple times that with voice, training time is reduced by 50%. It doesn’t take long for people to get up and running with voice. The deployment can take as little as a week or several months, depending on the scope of the project.

Agree or disgree with our guest expert's perspective? What would you add? Let us know your thoughts for publication in the SCDigest newsletter Feedback section, and on the web site. Upon request, comments will be posted with the respondents name or company withheld.

 
 
 
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