Overview

pCORE is New Zealand-based with approx. 20 employees located in NZ and the US. It was recently acquired by Descartes System Group. CORE has been a major player in the air package tracking industry since its inception in 2005 and currently provides tracking support for 85% of US Postal Service domestic package traffic and 15% of USPS’s international traffic.  CORE uses innovative tracking technologies and software solutions to provide their customers with up to-the-minute accuracy of shipment contents and locations worldwide throughout their delivery and supply chain networks worldwide. Among these innovative technologies is a Bluetooth-enabled IoT tag affixed to ULDs (Unit Load Device) or any other asset to automatically track its’ location throughout the world in real-time./p

Supernova Award Category

Data-Driven Digital Networks (DDNs) and Business Models

The Problem

pCORE is addressing an industry issue in transportation logistics (vs an organisational issue). Logistics involves the cooperation of all involved parties (i.e., shippers, carriers, ground handlers, destination recipient, etc). The holy grail for logistics customers is real-time, end to end visibility of location and condition (e.g., shock, temperature, etc)./p pTraditional barcoding and EDI solutions have failed to provide cross industry tracking while being expensive, labour intensive and error prone. Alternate technologies such as RFID have proven even more expensive and also have not provided the goal of end to end visibility./p pThere are plenty of industry statistics about the costs and impact of errors in the current logistics processes. CORE is providing a disruptive solution that changes existing processes enabling real-time, end-to-end visibility, while also providing new business opportunities. This innovation is non-incremental, making it difficult to measure against current processes and technology. /p pThe track and trace industry had been ripe for innovation for some time, with CORE taking the first steps to modernize this industry using the latest in IoT techniques, network and data movement technologies, as well as innovative business models to ease customer deployment in this new world of automated package/asset tracking./p

The Solution

pCORE looked for technology to remove the need to manually scan assets, while still providing a reliable signal for the presence of tracked items.  CORE selected Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology for tracking tags and developed sophisticated BLE-Cellular gateways.  /p pThese BLE tags are affixed to various assets, and the gateways are placed strategically around warehouses, airports, or other supply delivery locations.  As assets pass near the gateways, their location, contents and other metrics (such as temperature) are read and immediately transmitted to the COREInsights cloud platform for real-time, analytics-driven asset monitoring./p pThe business model ensures maximum network penetration and rapid adoption. CORE handles the capital costs of the network and charge customers only a tracking subscription fee, which allows for easier customer onramp. It is very analogous to cellular providers investing in cell towers and charging phone users for data usage./p

The results

pExisting systems are inefficient, requiring a person in close proximity to a tracked item. Human error, delays, and batch processing lead to out-of-date logistics details and potentially inaccurate asset tracking – which results in unnecessary expenses, reduced revenues, and unhappy customers./p pWith COREInsight, a company can see their goods at every link in the supply chain. Visibility is real-time during all modes of transport, from issuance of a purchase through delivery to consignee. Monitoring and analytics can be managed from any device. The solution also gives insight into behaviours of supply chain admin, shipping and receiving personnel.  Predictive analytics allow supply chain analysts to ask “what if” questions for improved performance./p pAs assets pass through facilities, staff are alerted to arriving content condition without need for hand-held scanners, along with all relevant paperwork which is synched with Transportation Management and ERP systems. Receiving plans can be prepared for cargo before the seal has even been broken./p pCustomer experience has shown that real-time automated tracking leads to savings via inventory reduction as well as real-time reaction to misrouting or other delays.  Air carriers now link waybills to tracking containers giving real-time pickup/delivery notifications to their customers./p pThis innovation is not an incremental improvement easily measured against current processes and technology./p

Metrics

pResults can best be illustrated by a number of customer examples:/p p• A carrier in New Zealand has been able to detect mis-deliveries at LHR and direct the ground handler in real-time to collect the unit from the wrong delivery point and deliver it to the correct delivery point. The carrier is subject to a service level agreement which includes financial penalties. In the past they would have just accepted the penalty as a cost of doing business. With COREInsight, manual audits of the ground handling facility at LHR have been cancelled in favor of real-time visibility, saving both time and resources for both parties./p p• Tracked units have been detected in locations totally unexpected by their owners. This is a frequent occurrence in the network and allows owners to actually reduce inventory and find assets closest to the point of need./p pWhen you multiply these examples by thousands of users across the network and one can get a sense of the potential impact this industry innovation provides./p

The Technology

pAside from the hardware-based BLE tags and gateways, CORE has built a proprietary “as-a-service” software platform and worldwide tracking network using Microsoft Azure as their foundation. All data and tracking events are streamed in real-time from the BLE gateways to the COREInsight application using an “event mesh” of Solace PubSub+ event brokers for fast and reliable data delivery./p

Disruptive Factor

pThe disruptive factor of this solution is the fundamental changes it makes in the “process” of tracking cargo and assets from “after the fact” audits to true real-time visibility.  The existing process is based on finding out the location of an asset once it has arrived – be it late, the wrong location, or in poor condition (among other things). Having continual, real-time monitoring of assets allows the client to immediately know when assets are behind schedule, being routed inappropriately, or in poor condition (ie. wrong temperature). This real-time knowledge allows shippers and supply chain personnel to take immediate action or plan for necessary down-stream changes./p pSuch real-time visibility also allows new revenue opportunities. One example are carriers that are charging extra for ULDs that are not returned in a timely manner, among other things./p

Shining Moment

pFor founder Ian Craig, it was while sitting in a Delta Airlines office in Atlanta after a BLE gateway was installed at Le Poste in CDG Airport.  The gateway picked up two AirNZ ULDs within range. The trouble was neither AirNZ, nor any of their partners fly to CDG.  Delta swiftly contacted AirNZ and arranged to fly them back to an AirNZ gateway hub in the US (LAX) – all of this happened in real-time while Ian was sitting there in the executive’s office./p