DHL tests wearable technology warehousing with Ricoh

DHL pilot with its customer Ricoh showed augmented reality technology increased efficiency in picking process, with uses in transportation and last mile delivery also possible.    DHL has carried out a pilot project testing smart glasses and augmented reality in a warehouse in the Netherlands.
   The global integrator and third party logistics services provider partnered with wearable computing solutions company Ubimax and DHL’s customer Ricoh to implement ‘vision picking’ in warehousing operations.
   Staff was guided through the warehouse by graphics displayed on the smart glass to speed up the picking process and reduce errors. DHL said it considered the pilot successful because it resulted in a 25 percent efficiency increase during the picking process.
   “Vision picking enables hands-free order picking and greatly increases productivity,” said Jan-Willem De Jong, technology business unit director, DHL Supply Chain, Benelux. “However, this is just the first step in our innovation journey as we believe augmented reality will become relevant for even more supply chain areas.”
   In June 2014, DHL’s trend research team released Augmented Reality in Logistics, a report describing best practices and promising use cases. In addition to vision picking in warehousing operations, the report suggests how operations during transportation, last mile delivery and value-added services could be improved by augmented reality applications.