Maintenance teams that are on the job somewhere in one of the many warehouses scattered around the port are often difficult to manage and monitor. For the shift manager, it is therefore important to be able to assist the team and to communicate which tasks have priority. A passive QR-NFC tag offers the solution here. Both own employees and external staff can send notifications and receive tasks on their smartphone.
During the preparation of the transport of cooling elements, things went wrong at Baltimore. All-Connects established a 'dialogue' between the finished goods and the forklift trucks.
Baltimore Aircoil Company (BAC) manufactures evaporative cooling towers and thermal storage solutions. The American company is part of the Amsted Industries group. Baltimore employs more than 2,000 people in facilities worldwide. Approximately 340 employees are active in the Belgian branch in Heist-op-den-Berg, which is also the European headquarters of BAC.
Because there were frequent problems in locating the correct finished products on the site, Baltimore looked for a solution to track them.
Ward Lemmens (Production Engineer) explains:
"We produce (sections of) cooling towers, which are assembled on site. On a typical day, there are about 150 of these sections on our site, ready to be transported to the customer. Often, it is quite a job to find the right elements. That's why we looked at how we could get a better overview of the finished products to greatly reduce the search work."
Baltimore devised a system to divide the warehouse into zones. The location of the cooling towers was recorded in a table, but it was not always possible to keep it up to date. Moreover, the available surface is quite limited and in peak periods elements had to be moved.
This experiment showed that automation was necessary. The first requested providers proposed to provide the 150 or so elements with a GPS tracker. Efficient, but with a (too) high price tag.
When Baltimore finally consulted All-Connects, a better alternative was soon on the table. The special thing about this track & trace solution is that it never leaves the Baltimore site. Each element that rolls off the production line is given a Bluetooth tracker. The eight forklift trucks are in turn equipped with a GPS tracker and a Bluetooth gateway.
"The system is ingenious in its simplicity. Every movement of the cooling tower activates the Bluetooth tracker and communicates with the tracker on the forklift truck. Thus, the exact location of the element on the site is always known. When loading the truck, the tracker is removed and reused for the next element," says Ward Lemmens.
Since it is a cloud-based solution, Baltimore carried out a data security risk assessment. The system was then tested on site. A few adjustments were necessary, as the application is slightly different from the standard product of All-Connects.
Ward looks back on the collaboration with satisfaction:
"We do not yet have concrete data to calculate the time and efficiency gains, but the employees involved clearly notice that everything is running better. We are also very enthusiastic about the possibility to link photos of cooling towers loaded on trucks to the system. That saves us a lot of unnecessary discussions afterwards. In short, All-Connects has certainly lived up to our expectations!"
Locating assets
A GPS + Bluetooth gateway was placed in the forklift trucks. A BLE (Bluetooth) tracker was attached to the cooling elements, which 'wakes up' when movement is detected and starts communicating with the BLE gateway of the forklift truck.
The CHECK.connects platform - powered by All-Connects - that can be used via desktop, and mobile app.
How do you remotely manage the maintenance and cleaning of dozens of warehouses spread throughout the port? How do you ensure that reports of dangerous situations in and around the depots can be quickly passed on and followed up? That is the question Katoen Natie wanted an answer to, and in their search they arrived at the Check.connects software of All-Connects.
Katoen Natie develops and delivers smarter logistics and engineering solutions, tailored to the specific situation of each customer. The company operates 150 port terminals, logistics terminals and on-site terminals for the loading and unloading of general cargo, breakbulk, cars and forest products. They employ 10,000 people. Their customers are mainly shipping companies specialising in petrochemicals, specialty chemicals and consumer goods.
In order to steer this enormous logistical operation in the right direction, Katoen Natie built gigantic platforms: these are logistical 'hubs' on the customer's site, in or behind large ports, in industrial centres or close to large consumers. These platforms have a large land area with approximately 50% covered warehouse space.
The maintenance and cleaning of these hubs, scattered in and around the port, proved to be a huge logistical challenge. In addition, there was no efficient system for quickly reporting unsafe situations, such as incorrectly placed equipment, waste left lying around, dangerous situations, etc. Employees reported this via e-mail, whatsapp, mobile phone, or verbally ... Employees would pass on reports via e-mail, whatsapp, mobile phone or verbally ... and they would be resolved, but not reported. and they were resolved, but because the reports were not recorded, it was impossible to check whether and when a reported problem had been resolved and where possible bottlenecks formed.
Katoen Natie now uses the CHECK.connects management application to manage the maintenance staff & to pass on urgent notifications from the various platform locations in a 'smart' way .
The facility manager creates the checklists on the management platform with a list of tasks to be performed for the daily cleaning in the different locations. The cleaning employee opens this checklist in the CHECK.connects app on his smartphone and starts his job. When he finishes his tasks, he checks in the app if he indeed performed all tasks. The system then asks if everything was OK. If the answer is negative, an error report is opened and the employee can indicate the possible problems, and possibly add a picture as proof. This report can be consulted by the facility manager, who can take the necessary actions and assign follow-up tasks.
Our QR code application turned out to be ideal for the requested functionality: Everyone, both an in-house employee and an external port worker who does not have access to the management application, can scan a QR code - linked to a device or room - with their own smartphone and open a 'guest page' on the CHECK app, without login details or compulsory registration. Via a handy form with targeted, relevant questions, the person can quickly pass on a report, and even add a photo to illustrate a defect, damage or unhygienic situation, for example. The responsible facility manager receives an instant notification and can immediately launch a follow-up task. All notifications are registered in a handy overview, which can be used to map out possible danger areas or frequently recurring problem situations. For Matthias De Smedt, general manager commodities at Katoen Natie, the new working method has already proved its worth:
"The combination of the app and the QR codes in our warehouses throughout the port represents more than just a digitalisation of our housekeeping. The most important asset is that all employees and visitors can report a housekeeping or safety problem in a structured way, without technical limitations. In this way we involve everyone in our 'continuous improvement' philosophy to make our warehouses a safer and better place to work and store goods."
Maintenance teams that are on the job somewhere in one of the many warehouses scattered around the port are often difficult to manage and monitor. For the shift manager, it is therefore important to be able to support the team and to communicate which tasks have priority. Therefore, they were looking for a handy tool where they could communicate with the team, but also where they could report dangerous situations directly to the right person.
Throughout each warehouse, a TAG.QR-NFC was placed at the desired spots. With an A4 size, these cannot be missed and the maintenance team and other colleagues can easily make reports. Management in turn can send notifications to the maintenance team to report any urgent tasks.
The person in charge of the maintenance team draws up the planning via the platform. This is sent out and reaches the employees via their mobile app. In this way, everyone receives the work tasks for a particular day or period. In case of any reports of risky situations, the person in charge can also report this to the desired employee(s) in order to give this task priority. Employees who do not have the mobile application can also make reports using the TAG.QR-NFC located throughout the warehouse.
Want to know more about how we can help you smartly manage your various warehouses or depots?
Request a demo.svg)
Would you like to discover together with our experts how you can monitor and manage your company's equipment at any time? Request a demo now to discover all the features.
.svg){kind=icon}
