Augmented Reality Takes Warehouse Smartphone App to the Next Level

Supply chain solutions provider, Agrippa Solutions revamped their smartphone app to capture shipping label data from pallets in a warehouse receiving area. The ability to scan multiple barcodes at once, with Scandit’s premium MatrixScan feature, had an immediate impact on saving time for their customers.

Using the smartphone-based Scandit solution for receiving in grocery warehouse logistics, one of our customers reported saving 30 minutes per container they discharge, compared to their previous method. The Scandit solution is really good. Each smartphone is really like its own warehouse terminal. We are entering an entirely different league.

Andre Pedersen, Sales and Partners Manager, Agrippa

Challenge

Add GS1 128 barcode scanning capability to the existing Agrippa smartphone app

Based in Norway, Agrippa Solutions (Agrippa) provides consultancy and software services in stock control, logistics, and the retail market. They deliver solutions for improvement and claims in logistics chains through their smartphone application – helping logistics companies identify and capture information about goods they receive at the warehouse. 

Information about the shipment is contained within a GS1 128 barcode shipping label containing data about the whole pallet and individual items on the pallet. A key requirement for Agrippa’s customers is to ensure shipments are correct and in good order on arrival. Any damaged or incorrect items must be accurately identified and claimed. Checks are also made to ensure that the contents are within the ‘best before’ date on the barcode. 

To complete this process quickly and efficiently, Agrippa needed to find a high-performance barcode scanning engine that captured all the shipping label barcodes on a pallet in one instance. This was crucial in terms of saving time for the app’s users. 

Solution

Integrate Scandit’s Barcode Scanner SDK with MatrixScan-AR to the mobile app

Initially, Agrippa looked at open-source mobile scanning solutions. However, they were too slow with unsatisfactory performance in poor lighting conditions. Additionally, the code was difficult to integrate into the core app. 

Christian Svendsen, Agrippa CTO, says one reason the company chose Scandit’s solution was its superior performance and scanning from a distance. This runs across different barcode formats and difficult lighting conditions. The other reason is its ability to handle “GS1 128 codes easily on ‘real world’ shipping labels that were blemished or damaged.”

Most importantly, Scandit offered MatrixScan and GS1 parsing functionality that enabled users to capture all the barcodes on each shipping label in a single instance and record all the data at once, saving significant amounts of time in the receiving process.

Christian Svendsen, CTO & Partner, Agrippa

Results

Savings per container

30 mins.

Man-hours saved daily while receiving goods

~4.5

Minutes to scan 66 pallets

<2

Significant time savings in container loading and unloading

The Scandit functionality was rapidly deployed with the SDK. Following integration, Agrippa said between 2.5 and 4.5 man-hours were saved each day during the goods receiving process. Svendsen said 66 pallets can be scanned in less than two minutes and at distances of up to half a meter. 

“The employees using the Scandit-powered system are very pleased. Workers can scan all the pallets in a container shipment in less than two minutes, sometimes right on the lorry. And they are scanning barcodes on pallets at distances of up to half a meter making the system more versatile than we could have imagined,” says Andre Pedersen.

Critical success factors for the Agrippa-Scandit partnership

• Ability to capture GS1 128 codes, and multiple barcodes in a single sequence with MatrixScan. 
• Superior performance: scanning speed, accuracy and adaptability to different lighting conditions, and distances.
• Easy integration into the existing Agrippa smartphone application. 

Future plans: Take Scandit self-scanning and AR to retailers

Agrippa has also created a white label self-scanning application for retailers, which features augmented reality (AR) to display product information after the scan. The app’s features include quick search-and-find, self-checkout, and on-screen product information displayed simply by scanning a barcode.

The first client to use the app is a large garden center chain with stores across Scandinavia. Moreover, despite being developed as a consumer app, it can also be used by retail employees for a range of operational tasks. This ranges from printing new product labeling to checking that the room temperature is right for certain plants – all done with barcode scanning and AR.