Peak-Ryzex Europe MD talks to HSS

Peak-Ryzex is a systems integrator offering best of breed warehouse and logistics IT solutions. We ask what benefits Peak can bring to your business.

HSS: What benefits do you bring to the warehouse customer?

Damian Penney: Best of breed solutions meet the exact needs of our customers; a perfect match maximises their ROI. We work with the major warehouse management software suppliers, so we understand what is required to integrate our mobility solutions and support them under very demanding working conditions. We’ll design a solution that fits the application precisely, choosing appropriate hardware and software that the end users will find easy to use, stage and roll out the solution, help with training, then manage them ensuring 100% uptime. With Peak-Ryzex also having a SAP Consultancy as part of the group, Movilitas Consulting, we are able to deliver fully configured SAP supply chain solutions enabling SAP transactions to be carried out on mobile devices.

HSS: Are there compatibility issues when working with a number of manufacturers?

DP: We’ve been in the supply chain and enterprise mobile space for more than 30 years so we have extensive knowledge of all the key hardware manufacturers. The collective know-how of our integration and hardware experts ensures that compatibility is guaranteed; we can’t give too much away as its one of our USPs. Suffice to say, whether a customer requires rugged, industrial technology or is branching out to integrate consumer devices elsewhere within the business, we get the job done so that it is business as usual for them.

HSS: What is the Next Working Day Exchange Service?

DP: With the Next Working Day Exchange Service (the service) we can configure, asset tag and send a ready-to-use device to minimise the disruption caused to your operations when a device needs to be repaired.

As soon as a repair request has been received Peak-Ryzex will send out a working device to be in your hands within one business day. Your replacement unit will arrive configured and ready for use.

The service is unique; yes other companies offer support, but what we do is different. Our ultimate goal is to keep the device fully operational in the hands of the user so we use the device data collected to proactively monitor trends in its usage and pinpoint areas to management that may need improvement. For example, this might be a specific warehouse with a high rate of device failures that may benefit from further user training.

The service provides:

• Management of the break-fix contract with Peak-Ryzex or the OEM.

• Buffer stock managed exclusively for your needs and held in a secure, customer-specific location.

• Calls logged either via the Peak-Ryzex Help Desk or 24/7 via the custom Peak-Ryzex web portal.

• Technical courier who understands your business, devices and needs.

• During a swap out, the Peak-Ryzex technical courier can swap SIM cards, SD cards and perform any last changes/configuration as required.

• Damaged devices are collected at the time of exchange and returned to the repair location. Once repaired they are returned to the customer specific buffer stock managed by Peak-Ryzex.

• Access to custom reports on fail rates, damage list etc, by location or user.
• Fully managed asset register, giving accurate lists of serial numbers by site.

HSS: How many service engineers do you have?

DP: Our UK-wide service centre is based at our European headquarters in Chippenham from where we provide service to more than 25,000 customers. In total, including our North American operations, we have 175 factory-trained and certified customer service engineers and support technicians averaging 15 years of industry experience.

HSS: What impact has eCommerce had on customer requirements?

DP: eCommerce is driving a revolution in the warehouse. The whole order to despatch and delivery process is so much faster because customers are able to place orders online with a few clicks and they expect them to be processed immediately. That means warehouse operations have to be efficient; mobile computing and automatic identification/data collection has been a great enabler and is helping to improve productivity and keep the end customer/consumer happy.

HSS: Have you seen much demand for RFID based solutions in warehousing and logistics?

DP: Let’s be careful about RFID; many see it as a panacea for all kinds of identification and automation applications but the truth is, it can be overkill and costly. Yes, it is in demand and yes it has a big future – and we have extensive experience and knowledge of working with the technology. However, in some situations it is unnecessary and barcode identification is perfectly adequate for stock management, picking, despatch and so on. With RFID there is a greater associated cost (so the application must need it rather than just want it), whereas the cost of barcode is negligible. From experience as the cost of RFID tags continue to reduce we would expect this area to grow, albeit slowly, especially around high value goods and assets.