Honeywell dives into software

For Honeywell, it's no longer just about the mobile computers, or the scanners, or the voice headsets. This year at ProMat, the company's story centers on the software it's developing to work with existing hardware. The aim: to help people and vehicles work more efficiently, effectively and safely.

The new software and data-collection suite, Operational Acuity, works with already-implemented mobile technology to capture and analyze operational data. It then uses predictive modeling techniques to produce what Bruce Stubbs, director of industry marketing at Honeywell Scanning & Mobility, calls "actionable insights."

The Operational Acuity portfolio features two initial solutions: Vehicle Performance and Workflow Performance.

The Vehicle Performance Solution leverages the user's existing network and Honeywell vehicle-mounted computers and includes a new vehicle sensor unit, badge reader and video cameras. This equipment enables vehicle access control and driver authentication; videotapes vehicle operation and worker performance; and senses, detects and documents any vehicle impact—such as a minor bump of a pallet—or incident.

When user-defined alerts occur, supervisors are notified on their mobile phones and can resolve them remotely or locally at their discretion. The solution provides management with performance insights that can be used to improve worker safety and compliance, analyze damaged-goods incidents, optimize vehicle use, and better control vehicle operating and maintenance costs. For example, if an accident occurs, the system can send video footage from the forklift's embedded camera to the supervisor, in order to identify the root cause and help with training.

The Workflow Performance Solution captures and analyzes how mobile workers in a distribution center perform various functions, and measures their proficiency using existing Honeywell Vocollect voice solutions. This helps management assess the value of process enhancements to various workflows; identify and eliminate causes of inefficiencies; maximize worker performance; and find worker training and support opportunities.

Both Workflow Performance and Vehicle Performance will be available in summer 2015.