WiMAX in Industry Verticals - Delivery Industry

Want to track that delivery up to the last block or minute? WiMAX is the answer.

I love tracking a package from FEDEX or UPS online. Online tracking has no doubt been one of the delivery industry's singular pieces of customer service genius. As you know the package is assigned a tracking number and a bar code is attached. Every stop along the way, the package bar code is read and the time and location of that reading is fed into a database which is then accessed online by all parties involved.

How could WiMAX improve this picture?

1.    The delivery companies could cooperate and graduate and build a nationwide WiMAX network (or at least in the most dense urban areas).

2.    Step 2 is where delivery people have WiMAX tablet type notebooks that scan the packages as they are delivered such that as packages are delivered that info is fed into the customer-accessible online database that would read "Package delivered 2:42 PM delivery truck #345". That device could be SMS and/or VoIP enabled providing real-time communications with a driver. Customers expecting a package that they would have to sign for could drop a short message to the driver "Yo, goin' out for a Starbucks back at 3 PM sharp, I promise! See ya then!"

3.    WiMAX telematics could be brought into play so that dispatchers would know where each delivery truck was in real time without having to radio the driver for his or her "20" (location). Many inefficiencies could be taken out of the system thus boosting profitability.

4.    Most delivery companies use bar code now but want to move to RFID. RFID readers could then relay that info via WiMAX as a backhaul to the larger network. That way, the reader could even be mobile and some packages might not even have to go through a warehouse for barcoding/scanning/logging. RFID could also interface with a WiMAX subscriber device in the delivery truck so that the delivery company could tell customers in real-time exactly where the package was.

5.    The first WiFi phones were incorporated into Symbol's bar code reader so that warehouse people could scan and talk at the same time. Really. WiMAX could be used to blanket enormous warehouse facilities with WiMAX such that multiple WiFi access points need not be installed and managed over that great complexes.

6.    Now lets stretch it a little further: ground-based WiMAX base stations in ground-to-air mode with cargo planes to track airborne planes over their predictable air routes. In other words, no more scanning and entering into a database. Just stick RFID tags on 'em, load and go. Tag reading and database reading can happen while airborne. Forget overnight delivery, we'll have it there Tonight.

Frank Ohrtman
WMX Systems

Monday, January 29, 2007 in Applications | Archives | Business  | Permalink |  Comments (1)