Lucasware Jennifer Warehouse Management

Interview with Lucasware, Makers of Jennifer Voice Directed Warehouse Management Solutions

Lucas Systems has been around since 1998, with a single focus on voice-directed warehouse applications. Their founder and CEO, Rick Brown, founded Lucas with a vision that was completely different from anyone else in the voice business at that time.

Up to that time, companies in the industrial voice market all developed their own voice-only mobile computers as well as the speech recognition technology used in the systems. In effect, the speech recognition software was tied to the hardware platform.

Rick believed that since larger companies like IBM, Microsoft, and others were investing heavily in speech technology, there was no way niche players could keep up. He also envisioned that the manufacturers of rugged mobile computer used in warehouses – like Symbol Technologies (which was acquired by Motorola in 2008), Intermec and others – would support voice recognition capabilities, so customers wouldn’t have to buy expensive, limited purpose voice only computers.

So Lucas was going to focus its research and investment on developing voice directed warehouse applications that would leverage best-available speech recognition technology and open, industry standard mobile computers made by large, well-known companies like Symbol/Motorola.

That was the vision, but they were about 6 years ahead of the market.
In 1998 there were no standard mobile computers that could support voice recognition applications in a warehouse, and like I said, the makers of voice-only hardware devices bundled their own proprietary speech recognition technology with the hardware.

So from 1998 through about 2004, all the Lucas software applications – which they call Jennifer™ (yes, it uses a female voice) – were delivered using the voice recognition technology and voice-only hardware of other companies. Their two major hardware suppliers – Vocollect and Voxware – also competed with Lucas to sell their software.

Needless to say, Lucas was at a cost disadvantage to those hardware companies, but they still managed to win more than their share of the business by focusing on building better application software. And some very big companies like C&S Wholesale Grocers and Cardinal Health chose Jennifer by Lucas despite their cost disadvantage on hardware.
Since then, the market has caught up with Rick’s vision.

And since 2005 every Jennifer voice application that they have installed is running on open, industry standard mobile computers from Motorola/Symbol, Intermec and other established hardware providers.

Lucas is now one of the fastest-growing voice providers in this market, and the leader in second-generation voice systems that they refer to as voiceplus: warehouse applications that combine voice with other technologies like barcode scanners, RFID readers, touchscreen displays, etc.

Today, I’ll be interviewing John Schriefer from Lucasware.

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What are some of the biggest problems faced by warehouse managers today? What are some of the biggest problems associated with paper-based ticket systems for warehouses?

Many of the challenges that drove warehouse managers to adopt voice back in the late ‘90s and early 2000s are still with us: the need to reduce distribution costs, minimize returns, improve inventory accuracy, etc. But those challenges are more acute today than they were three or four years ago.

Due to the recession, there is less product flowing through warehouses so its even more imperative to reduce operating costs, and that’s what voice does. First, by helping warehouse associates work more productively, and second, by helping them work more accurately.

Warehouses that aren’t using voice today to pick customer orders are either using paper or mobile computers with barcode scanners. Paper-based picking is slow and error prone, since workers are carrying paper, reading items off of lists, and crossing off items or making notes on the paper if things aren’t in stock.

Basically, their focus is partly on their pick tickets and partly on the work they are doing, which leads to errors and reduces efficiency. Barcode-scanning systems provide better accuracy than paper, but they typically aren’t any more efficient because workers still need to read instructions from a screen, press keys to enter information, and handle the scanner to confirm what they are doing.

So warehouses that are looking to boost productivity and reduce return costs are turning to voice to replace their paper- or scanning-based picking processes. Companies using paper-based systems today are also looking for a way to give warehouse managers real-time information about productivity and work in process so they can manage the warehouse better, and that’s another thing they get form a voice system like Jennifer.

How can a voice picking system like Jennifer help with the productivity, accuracy or efficiency?

Unlike paper-or scan-based systems, where users need to read their pick instructions from paper lists or computer screens, a Jennifer voice system provides verbal instructions to the worker so they never need to stop and read, and both of their hands are always free.

And to confirm they are picking the right items and quantities, the workers speak unique location numbers and tell the system how many they are picking at every step. Again, with voice, a worker’s eyes are focused on what he is doing (not paper or a computer screen), and his hands are always free to grab items rather than handling scanners or lists.

So, first and foremost, voice is an eyes- and hands-free process which improves productivity – there’s no stopping and starting to read instructions, put down the paper or mobile computer scanner, etc. And it’s more accurate because the worker is always looking at the location or item them are picking, rather than a piece of paper or computer screen.

But that’s only part of it. Since voice is more accurate than scanning or paper, it also allows warehouse managers to implement other process changes that can drive even greater gains in productivity.

For example, in many warehouses using paper or scanning, workers may only pick a single customer order at a time to avoid mistakes. But since voice helps eliminate errors, warehouses can more confidently ask workers to pick two or more orders at a time. And that’s where you start to see really significant gains in productivity, like 50, 60, or even greater than 100 percent.

That’s one aspect of voice that many warehouse managers don’t recognize: instead of just voice-enabling your current process, you can get even better gains in productivity and accuracy if you optimize your processes using voice. Lucas puts a great deal of emphasis on this.

We’re not just interested in putting voice on top of a sub-optimal process. We want to work with customers to find ways to maximize the value of voice in their operations. To optimize the process, sometimes that may mean using voice along with scanning, touch screens, or other technologies.

Frankly, that’s another great advantage of using a standard mobile computer for voice – the scanner and screen are part of the device at no additional cost, so its easy to create powerful VoicePlus or multi-modal systems.

What should companies look for in a warehouse picking system?

Some of the first questions we get from customers are: does your recognition technology work in a noisy environment, how easily does the voice system integrate with my warehouse management and automation systems, and how flexible is the voice application to support my unique process requirements today and in the future.

Although voice recognition is a proven technology in the warehouse – we have more than 300 warehouses using Jennifer in North America alone – its still important for customers to evaluate the underlying voice recognition technology of any supplier.

If the speech recognition software doesn’t work well in your environment, and users are constantly repeating themselves or getting other errors, you’re just not going to get the productivity you need, and users are going to grow frustrated, which is the worst thing that could happen.

Integration is also very important, since the voice system relies on data from the WMS to get the correct instructions to workers. Jennifer works with any WMS. We have a pre-defined integration framework that is designed to work with leading packages like RedPrairie, SAP, Infor, Manhattan Associates and dozens of others, or with legacy packages and home-grown mainframe systems.

Frankly, integration is important, but we’ve taken a lot of the complexity out of it.
Similar to our integration approach, we have a modular application framework that is designed to adapt to the unique process requirements of different warehouses without custom development.

And that’s very important, because on the one hand, every warehouse wants a voice system that can be optimized for their needs, but they don’t want an application that is highly customized so it can’t be changed.

Equally important, warehouse managers are looking for systems that include configuration capabilities that they can manage without the need for IT staff. This isn’t a unique requirement to voice software. It’s similar to what warehouse managers want in their WMS.

How hard is it to train non-technical employees to use the system?

Ease of use and training is a really important issue in warehouses, in part because of high turnover, and also because many warehouses have big seasonal peaks that mean they need to hire and train large numbers of temporary workers.

And this is one area where voice really shines, because it is an inherently easy technology to learn to use.

We’ve seen customers who could train a new employee to use voice in less than a day. What’s more, new workers get up to speed more quickly and with fewer errors than with any other technology.

If you can follow verbal instructions, you can use voice. Workers who are somewhat techno-phobic tend do really well with voice because they don’t have to learn to use the computer beyond signing on by keying in a password, which isn’t any harder than using an ATM.

They don’t have to learn arcane commands and navigate through computer menus, so its simple.

I’ve noticed that you’ve built Jennifer using a service-oriented architecture? What were your reasons for going this route?

Any software vendor that is not building their software in a service-oriented architecture is behind the state of the market and not going to be in business very long.

Our modular SOA approach is a key reason for our application flexibility, both from a workflow/process perspective, and also from an integration perspective. But really, today SOA is a given – if a software product isn’t designed in an SOA using open technology, IT departments aren’t going to consider it.

What do you see in the future for warehouse management technology?

There’s a great deal of investment in warehouse automation technologies today – ranging from robotics to automated storage and retrieval systems – and we see many of those technologies merging with voice.

Likewise, the major trend in warehouse management software today is towards so-called multi-modal systems that combine voice, scanning, RFID and other technologies to improve the hands-on process (like picking).

We call that VoicePlus and every Jennifer VoicePlus application today allows users to use voice, scanning and screens, and more and more warehouses are taking advantage of that to create really interesting, productive processes. In the future we’re going to see more voice-directed systems that will make use of RFID, both to improve the traceability of products, but also to improve the hands-on process.

The other leading trend – and this ties directly into the use of voice, scanning and RFID – is towards real-time reporting systems that give managers better insight and control into what is happening on the warehouse floor.

For example, what is the current status of order picking, what are my current productivity rates, where do I have stock outs or other bottlenecks? We’ve always provided rich management capabilities as part of the Jennifer system, so we’ve taken that one step further to provide visual reporting capabilities and mobile reporting tools that allow managers to get away from their desks without losing sight of what’s going on in the warehouse.