Smart Pallet Tracking Solution for Real-Time Logistics Visibility

Within the logistics industry, the safety and visibility of transported products are of great importance. However, transportation tools such as pallets or carts are often neglected. Even though not as valuable as cargo, they are essential assets for logistics businesses in daily operations. Manual recording methods cannot provide real-time monitoring during constant and dynamic logistic processes. This is where IoT-enabled smart tracking solutions take roles, offering an automatic and precise alternative for tool security.

Challenge

A French logistics business has recently struggled with a problem that related to wooden pallet management. These wooden pallets, are critical tools for companies to protect the transported products like precision instruments and medical equipment. By offering a relatively stable base, these pallets prevent most damage during transit, ensuring the safe arrival of transported products to destinations. However, without a useful management method, these pallets could only be recorded by specific employee about their reference numbers and where they would be shipped. It was quite difficult to obtain the precise location of these pallets manually especially during transportation. Over a long time, many wooden pallets were lost and cannot be found anywhere, resulting in direct asset losses.

Another important point is that the circulation of these pallets is not good. There was no standardized process for these pallets to return or redistribute after their arrival at destinations. Without being properly utilized, many of them were left in customer warehouses for days or even weeks. Such pallet stagnation not only reduced circulation efficiency, but also increased potential demand for new pallet purchases. To better manage these pallets and reduce unnecessary expenses, a useful pallet management system becomes an urgent necessity.

Solution

To establish a smart pallet management system, the company has equipped one container tracker on every wooden pallet. Shaped in a long-strip design, the tracker could be inserted into a pallet without effort. Such seamless integration ensures that these trackers will not draw much attention during daily logistics operations. By combining LoRaWAN^® network transmission with Bluetooth and GPS fix technologies, these trackers could locate pallets and share their locations in both outdoor and indoor environments. In open outdoor settings, the tracker uses GPS technology to capture accurate location in real-time. While in indoor areas where GPS signals are blocked, the tracker could scan pre-installed Bluetooth anchors to get the precise location.

Via the LoRaWAN^® gateway, the information of every pallet could be transferred to cloud-based software platform. Managers are able to get the basic and location information easily, enabling real-time monitoring and inventory optimization. Beyond location tracking, pallets are less likely to be stolen or lost due to these trackers incorporate anti-demolition feature. Once an unauthorized removal attempt is detected, the tracker will trigger an instant alert. By adopting such an advanced management method, the company not only significantly improves the visibility and security of these pallets, but also highly enhances operational efficiency, further reducing operating costs.

Featured Products

LW012 LoRaWAN^® Container Tracker is a long strip tracker engineered to revolutionize asset management and logistics operations. By combining LoRaWAN^® network transmission with Bluetooth and GPS fix technologies, it offers unparalleled flexibility and versatility in tracking containers across indoor warehouses, large distribution centers, and vast outdoor spaces.