Mobis Parts Australia is responsible for the distribution of parts and accessories for Kia vehicles in Australia and Hyundai in Asia Pacific.
When dated technology threatened the efficiency of their Australian distribution network, they engaged Skywire to help them move to a multi-modal voice solution, that increased their overall efficiencies and scanning accuracy.
Headquartered in Seoul, South Korea, and with subsidiaries in approximately 40 countries worldwide, Mobis manages the supply chain for automobile industry heavyweights Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors. Mobis Parts Australia (MPAU) is the automotive supplier’s Australian subsidiary and is responsible for supplying after sales car parts and accessories for Hyundai and Kia vehicles in Australia and Hyundai in Asia Pacific. The company dispatches 6000 – 7000 line items daily, an average of 600 parts per hour. With a high volume of parts flowing in and out of the warehouse, and with stringent cut-off times for morning and afternoon dispatches, even small inefficiencies in the process can have a major impact on productivity and on the capacity of Mobis to manage the volume.
Challenge
When dated technology threatened the efficiency of its Australian distribution network, Mobis looked at voice solutions in the market with the goal to move to a multi-modal voice solution, that increases the overall efficiencies and scanning accuracy. With 59 million Hyundai and Kia vehicles on the road worldwide, and the complexities of after sales parts supply management chain, Mobis needed a sophisticated warehouse solution to match the reputation of its brand – one that could efficiently track stock, pick orders and increase its distribution volume and the bottom line. The challenge was to refresh Mobis’ equipment and adopt a modernised solution that would complement its custom warehouse management system, while solving the issue of Microsoft ‘end-oflife’ support for Windows embedded handheld devices. Importantly Mobis required a solution that provided these added benefits without having to make any changes to their backend warehouse management system
Solution
TRANSITIONING TO A MULTI-MODAL VOICE PICKING SYSTEM
Mobis engaged Skywire as their trusted mobility partner to help design, build and pilot a solution. Working in close collaboration with Mobis, Skywire and Ivanti ran a pilot test using Zebra’s Voice Directed Picking (VDP) solution in a section within the warehouse. The results delivered were extremely promising offering a 15 per cent productivity increase, and an additional 39 per cent reduction in errors compared to voice-only solutions. After reviewing the results from the pilot stage, Mobis opted to go with Zebra’s multi-modal solution: Zebra WT6000 wearable mobile computer with ring scanner running on Ivanti Velocity. This would include a future VDP component, Ivanti Speakeasy, therefore accommodating all of Mobis’ requirements from company-wide IT upgrades, budgets, platform and specific operational needs.
“The take up of the new technology has been rapid and decisive. Operators only need a day to become thoroughly familiar with the new devices. We are already seeing the benefits from the initial roll-out with staff already eager to know when they were going to get theirs.” Darren Bowley Mobis Australia
The rollout is being deployed in multiple phases over a period of twelve months. The first phase of the deployment focused on improving the effectiveness of the wearable devices with tailored scripts developed by Skywire and Ivanti to automate the modernisation of more than 500 screens.This significantly decreased the error rates enabling increased text size, as well as the use of different font colours resulting in faster transactions.
The second phase of the deployment of 30 Zebra’ WT6000 and Bluetooth ring scanners, running on Ivanti Velocity, with more scheduled to be deployed in mid-2020. The Android platform is supported by Zebra’s Lifeguard program and will ensure the ongoing security and integrity of the solution. Most importantly, Mobis can run different applications on the mobile system and enjoy the freedom to innovate as needed, taking its operational excellence to the next level.
Darren Bowley, Warehouse Operations Manager at Mobis Australia said, “We needed a solution that would help increase productivity while seamlessly integrating with our warehouse management system. The rugged, multi-touch capacitive display on the WT6000 makes it easy for our workers across the supply chain to read and enter data, even while wearing work gloves. Moreover, it meant we could easily add voice-directed applications at any time to increase both the accuracy and speed of our pick and scan operations”.
The final deployment phase will include the adoption of voice picking using Ivanti Speakeasy and will roll out in 2020 post the migration to Android devices.
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