Zebra's Industry Solutions can give your business a competitive advantage by connecting people, assets and data to help you make better decisions.
Scale and energize your retail strategy with a digital backbone that unifies your team, informs priorities and drives results with Zebra's retail technology solutions.
Zebra’s mobile computing, scanning, and printing solutions connect each operational area in your warehouse to give you the agility to realize transformational gains.
Zebra's healthcare technology solutions provide patient identity management, mobile health devices, and business intelligence data to improve efficiency.
Zebra’s manufacturing technology solutions enable manufacturers to become more agile, optimize plant floor performance and embrace market changes.
Zebra's market-leading solutions and products improve customer satisfaction with a lower cost per interaction by keeping service representatives connected with colleagues, customers, management and the tools they use to satisfy customers across the supply chain.
In today's world, the demands on transportation and logistics companies are higher than ever. Dedicated Warehouse, Fleet and Delivery, and Yard and Terminal solutions enable visibility to every aspect of your business and keep operations running flawlessly around the clock.
Zebra's hospitality technology solutions equip your hotel and restaurant staff to deliver superior customer and guest service through inventory tracking and more.
Empower your field workers with purpose-driven mobile technology solutions to help them capture and share critical data in any environment.
Learn how Zebra's public sector technology solutions empower state and local governments to improve efficiency with asset tracking and data capture devices.
Zebra's range of Banking technology solutions enables banks to minimize costs and to increase revenue throughout their branch network. Learn more.
Zebra's range of mobile computers equip your workforce with the devices they need from handhelds and tablets to wearables and vehicle-mounted computers.
Zebra's desktop, mobile, industrial, and portable printers for barcode labels, receipts, RFID tags and cards give you smarter ways to track and manage assets.
Zebra's 1D and 2D corded and cordless barcode scanners anticipate any scanning challenge in a variety of environments, whether retail, healthcare, T&L or manufacturing.
Zebra's extensive range of RAIN RFID readers, antennas, and printers give you consistent and accurate tracking.
Choose Zebra's reliable barcode, RFID and card supplies carefully selected to ensure high performance, print quality, durability and readability.
Zebra's location technologies provide real-time tracking for your organization to better manage and optimize your critical assets and create more efficient workflows.
Zebra's rugged tablets and 2-in-1 laptops are thin and lightweight, yet rugged to work wherever you do on familiar and easy-to-use Windows or Android OS.
With Zebra's family of fixed industrial scanners and machine vision technologies, you can tailor your solutions to your environment and applications.
Discover Zebra’s range of accessories from chargers, communication cables to cases to help you customize your mobile device for optimal efficiency.
Zebra's OEM scan engines, imagers, and private label OEM products offer flexible integration and help enhance product development with modern OEM technology.
Zebra's environmental sensors monitor temperature-sensitive products, offering data insights on environmental conditions across industry applications.
Keep labor costs low, your talent happy and your organization compliant. Create an agile operation that can navigate unexpected schedule changes and customer demand to drive sales, satisfy customers and improve your bottom line.
Empower the front line with prioritized task notification and enhanced communication capabilities for easier collaboration and more efficient task execution.
Get full visibility of your inventory and automatically pinpoint leaks across all channels.
Reduce uncertainty when you anticipate market volatility. Predict, plan and stay agile to align inventory with shifting demand.
Drive down costs while driving up employee, security, and network performance with software designed to enhance Zebra's wireless infrastructure and mobile solutions.
Explore Zebra’s printer software to integrate, manage and monitor printers easily, maximizing IT resources and minimizing down time.
Make the most of every stage of your scanning journey from deployment to optimization. Zebra's barcode scanner software lets you keep devices current and adapt them to your business needs for a stronger ROI across the full lifecycle.
RFID development, demonstration and production software and utilities help you build and manage your RFID deployments more efficiently.
RFID development, demonstration and production software and utilities help you build and manage your RFID deployments more efficiently.
Zebra DNA is the industry’s broadest suite of enterprise software that delivers an ideal experience for all during the entire lifetime of every Zebra device.
Advance your digital transformation and execute your strategic plans with the help of the right location and tracking technology.
Boost warehouse and manufacturing operations with Symmetry, an AMR software for fleet management of Autonomous Mobile Robots and streamlined automation workflows.
The Zebra Aurora suite of industrial automation software enables users of all experience levels to solve their track-and-trace and vision inspection needs.
Zebra Aurora Focus brings a new level of simplicity to controlling enterprise-wide manufacturing and logistics automation solutions. With this powerful interface, it’s easy to set up, deploy and run Zebra’s Fixed Industrial Scanners and Machine Vision Smart Cameras, eliminating the need for different tools and reducing training and deployment time.
Aurora Imaging Library™, formerly Matrox Imaging Library, machine-vision software development kit (SDK) has a deep collection of tools for image capture, processing, analysis, annotation, display, and archiving. Code-level customization starts here.
Aurora Design Assistant™, formerly Matrox Design Assistant, integrated development environment (IDE) is a flowchart-based platform for building machine vision applications, with templates to speed up development and bring solutions online quicker.
Designed for experienced programmers proficient in vision applications, Aurora Vision Library provides the same sophisticated functionality as our Aurora Vision Studio software but presented in programming language.
Aimed at machine and computer vision engineers, Aurora Vision Studio software enables users to quickly create, integrate and monitor powerful machine vision applications without the need to write a single line of code.
Adding innovative tech is critical to your success, but it can be complex and disruptive. Professional Services help you accelerate adoption, and maximize productivity without affecting your workflows, business processes and finances.
Zebra's Managed Service delivers worry-free device management to ensure ultimate uptime for your Zebra Mobile Computers and Printers via dedicated experts.
Find ways you can contact Zebra Technologies’ Support, including Email and Chat, ask a technical question or initiate a Repair Request.
Zebra's Circular Economy Program helps you manage today’s challenges and plan for tomorrow with smart solutions that are good for your budget and the environment.
The Zebra Knowledge Center provides learning expertise that can be tailored to meet the specific needs of your environment.
Zebra has a wide variety of courses to train you and your staff, ranging from scheduled sessions to remote offerings as well as custom tailored to your specific needs.
Build your reputation with Zebra's certification offerings. Zebra offers a variety of options that can help you progress your career path forward.
Build your reputation with Zebra's certification offerings. Zebra offers a variety of options that can help you progress your career path forward.
Did you know that the Digital Era (also known as the Third Industrial Revolution) actually started somewhere between the 1950s and 1970s? That means that businesses have been taking strides to computerize processes and ditch paper-based workflows for over 50 years!
Yet, many companies today are still asking, “Is it really possible to go fully paperless? And if so, is it a moon-shot or a slam dunk?”
In reality, the answer is that going paperless is not only viable, but more easily achieved than you might think. Information technology software has matured enough to completely automate cross-functional workflows, and rugged mobile computing technologies have proven more than capable of serving as reliable "command and control" devices for workers that spend their days on the move. The days of true fixed terminal PCs and pounds of paper-based technical manuals are fleeting for the field service and industrial sectors, including manufacturing, energy, utilities and even government. Fixed-location systems meant that paper was needed to bridge from the service world to the information-system world. But today, a truly mobile environment with real-time access is very practical. In other words, it is possible for companies to go fully paperless.
But should every company completely digitalize their operations? Many approach this as an incremental path – automate process A, then process B, etc. But with the complete solutions available today, does it make sense to move so slowly, especially when the benefits of automation are so dramatic in reduced costs (increased productivity), higher quality service, and improved customer satisfaction? The question is: Do they have the confidence, commitment and know-how to work through the complexities that are par for the course during a digital transformation of any scale? Just as important, do they have the right mobility solution to foster a digital-only workflow and data management system for today’s widely disseminated workforce?
Substantial Opportunity, Even More Sizeable Task
Many companies will admit that they’re finding it nearly impossible to go fully paperless, despite the many technology resources available to facilitate such a transition. As a result, they are leaning into a model that reduces paper processes and printing, but doesn’t fully eliminate hard copy workflows or recordkeeping.
Many of these “execution” challenges were revealed in this VDC Research white paper. Field service organizations are finding it difficult to effectively apply modern technologies in support of “last mile” service delivery as quickly as desired – and as quickly as necessary.
As researcher David Krebs noted: “From the pervasive use of inflexible legacy solutions to the limited visibility into the complete field service workflow provided by existing processes—often still pen and paper based, the opportunity to modernize the job-site field service operations is substantial. Nowhere is this more evident than at the point of asset interaction where technicians are performing maintenance and inspection services…”
While the continued use of “inflexible legacy solutions” is certainly going to curb progress toward meaningful business modernization, the truth is that organizations aren’t struggling to execute a fully paperless operation because of technological limitations. The many software solutions available along with mobile computing technology required to achieve complete digitalization have been widely available and well-proven to support paperless processes in every private and public sector enterprise environment for more than two decades. Rather, many companies are struggling to achieve their paperless goals for one of two reasons:
1. They have chosen the wrong mobility solution for their various workers and workflows.
2. There have been oversights or missteps during technology implementation.
Krebs again: “Specifically, existing solutions fall short of more seamlessly integrating job-site specific reporting into their field service management platforms, leading to poor or inaccurate workflow reporting and workflow inefficiencies. Moreover, the mobile computing and communications used by frontline field service technicians are often not optimized for highly mobile workflows—the ubiquitous vehicle-mounted PC is often left behind in the service vehicles—and are based on legacy or proprietary platforms, incurring higher ownership and support costs.”
That begs the question: How can field service organizations more successfully identify mobile computing platforms that are optimized for frontline workers, and how do we ensure they are effectively integrate into each organization’s unique business structure? After all, as you will see below, it is VERY POSSIBLE for businesses to go fully paperless with the right team and technology in place.
A step-by-step guide to helping those who “walk and work” move to a paperless workflow
As noted upfront in this mobility buying guide for field service, industrial and enterprise organizations:
“The crowded mobile device marketplace can make for a tedious and confusing buying journey, and many honest missteps can be made along the way. For example, it’s not enough to deploy out-of-the-box platforms from familiar consumer brands in order to check a few boxes and make the claim that you’re now a “mobile” organization. Nor can you merely spend a few extra dollars on a “rugged” case and prove the business case for an iPad in an industrial or field service environment. Rugged tablet “knockoffs", those that claim to be inherently rugged but lack quality engineering and testing, can be deceiving too. Very few manufacturers engineer flexible rugged computer technologies that allow you to implement future-proof mobility solutions with immediate benefits, without compromising on features, price or performance today. In other words, buying mobile technology for your workforce is very different from buying a device for personal use.”
That is why one of the first things you must do, before even preparing a short list of potential mobility solutions, is to identify the issues compelling you to move to a completely paperless operation – or to reboot your existing technology architecture to achieve your paperless goals. You also need to identify and partner with a technology provider that specializes both in enterprise-grade mobility solutions and the specific vertical industry in which you operate, such as field service, manufacturing, public safety, utilities. (Tips on how to do that can be found in this webinar.)
However, those are only two of the 10+ steps that every organization must complete in order to secure their desired mobile technology ROI, whether taking a “paper light” approach and digitalizing a single business process within a single division or transitioning to a completely paperless operation company wide. Here is the more extensive game-plan that organizations should following when going paperless, as thoroughly detailed in this mobility buying playbook:
1. Know What’s Fueling Your Buying Journey.
2. Determine Your Budget and Secure Executive Buy-In.
3. Shop for the Right Partner.
4. Invite Others Along for the Ride.
5. Be Willing to Go with the (Work)Flow.
6. Complete the Mobile Technology Requirements Worksheet.
7. Reconfigure Your Budget Based on Your Updated Requirements.
8. Test Drive Short-Listed Mobile Devices. This is the ONLY way to truly confirm performance in the field, which is becoming non-negotiable for field service organizations that want to avoid a repeat of the issues outlined in VDC’s report.
9. Calculate the "Total Cost" of Your Mobility Solution.
10. Refine Your Solution-Based on End-User Feedback.
11. Make Sure You’ve Asked All the Right Questions, Considered the Future and Trained All Users.
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Editor’s Note: Still believe it’s too aspirational to think your business can go completely paperless? MH Equipment, Transportadora De Gas Del Sur (TGS), the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality and a top German auto manufacturer have all proven that it can be done. We will share each of their experiences “going paperless” in an upcoming blog. Stay tuned into Your Edge to read their stories.
Durable Mobility Technologies, LLC, under the direction of Bob Ashenbrenner, works with Zebra Technologies to develop future-proof mobility solutions for customers across multiple field service and industrial sectors. As an industry consultant, Durable Mobility Technologies, LLC, is focused on optimizing rugged tablet-based solutions for mobile workers of all kinds, including utility and public safety professionals. Ashenbrenner is particularly committed to helping customers identify mobile devices that survive a tough work day, run all the software and tools needed today, and will remain flexible and scalable to adapt to evolving technology applications as business needs dictate.
Ashenbrenner has more than 25 years of computer engineering and engineering management experience, with 18 of those specific to mobility and the field requirements that enable real work to happen. He was previously a Solutions Architect with Xplore Technologies and Motion Computing for 13 years. In that role, Ashenbrenner led the development of a suite of rugged mobile tablet computer, services and software, with an emphasis on supporting the whole mobile work environment.
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