Ehrhardt + Partner upgrades voice-directed warehouse system

Logistics technology vendor Ehrhardt + Partner Solutions Inc. today said it has launched an upgrade to its voice-driven warehouse workflow system that uses specialized software to recognize workers' spoken words, allowing them to skip the time-intensive training templates required for most voice-directed picking systems.

Charlotte, N.C.-based Ehrhardt + Partner said its Lydia Voice 8 platform uses "deep neural network technology" to deliver the "near perfect" voice recognition performance required for industrial environments. In contrast to older voice-based systems that rely solely on acoustics to recognize workers' commands and replies, Lydia Voice 8 uses a similar approach to smart speakers like Amazon.com Inc.'s Alexa and Apple Inc.'s Siri, the company says.

The upgrade is also effective at supporting diverse workforces with a wide range of accents and dialects, and at streamlining the training process for temporary and day-labor voice-enabled workers, the firm said.

Ehrhardt + Partner plans to market the upgraded platform to firms that need to support improved worker efficiency to meet e-commerce demands, such as the explosion of smaller and more frequent orders handled in DCs, Ehrhardt + Partner North American President Scott Deutsch said in a statement.

The Lydia Voice 8 platform also supports integration with a wider range of Bluetooth wireless headsets and with consumer handhelds running Google Inc.'s Android operating system, which are typically less expensive than voice-only devices, Ehrhardt + Partner said.