The Challenge
A leading parcel delivery service, CouriersPlease needed a solution to improve asset management of 3,500 parcel cages to reduce loss and optimise distribution of over 30 million parcels per year, while the business experienced annual growth of 80 percent.
The Opportunity
CouriersPlease deployed an IoT-enabled, flexible asset track and trace solution from Optus and Thinxtra to get real-time visibility into the location of each individual parcel cage at any time.
Partnership Solution
The asset tracking solution lets CouriersPlease:
- scale efficiently
- use location data insights to reduce instances of lost, stolen and underutilised parcel cages
- optimise operations amid significant business growth
CouriersPlease is a parcel delivery service and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Singapore Post (SingPost). The company delivers parcels across Australia through a network of 750 franchises and 350 delivery partners. Between 2019 and 2021, CouriersPlease experienced an 80 percent increase in business because of nationwide COVID-19 lockdowns. The company now moves more than 30 million parcels every year, using around 3,500 parcel cages to manage its freight.
While losing parcel cages is not a new challenge, the cost of solving the problem in the past had always outweighed the cost of the asset losses. With each parcel cage costing approximately. A$1,000, CouriersPlease expected the losses to rapidly become unsustainable as its business expanded. Missing cages represented a high ongoing cost to the business and created supply chain inefficiencies.
Fixing the lost parcel cage problem and maintaining high service standards for franchisees and customers became a pressing business challenge to solve.
A new solution to an old problem
The CouriersPlease team approached Optus for advice on how to reduce its asset losses.
Zorawar Singh, Head of Core Product at Optus Enterprises, says, “At a high level, the solution seemed to be a form of asset tracking. A typical challenge with tracking systems is to make sure the solution is cost-effective and relevant to the tracked asset and the data needed from the asset. There is a wide range of tracking devices and prices. Yet, paying $500 for a tracking device on an asset valued at $1,000 doesn’t make sense. The asset’s tracking requirements don’t justify the cost.”
Optus Enterprise partnered with Thinxtra to provide the right IoT-enabled tracking solution at a viable total cost of ownership. Thinxtra’s 0G Network transmits small amounts of information from connected IoT devices across vast distances.
If we didn't have this partnership with Thinxtra, our team could not have solved CourierPlease's problem cost-effectively. The alternatives were more expensive, less flexible, scalable, user-friendly, and more difficult to implement. We believe Thinxtra's powerful, national 0G Network is the best connectivity solution and offers the greatest value for the customer. There is simply no need for customers to build and maintain network infrastructure because Thinxtra has it ready to go
Zorawar Singh,
Head of Product at Optus Enterprise
Courier companies rely on cages to efficiently move large quantities of parcels around the country every day. Keeping track of these expensive assets is an industry-wide challenge. Thinxtra has provided CouriersPlease with an easy-to-use, cost-effective solution that reduces the loss of cages and helps better planning, enabling us to scale up quickly with our assets in the right location to meet the needs of our customers.
Janine Zammit,
Chief Operating Officer at CouriersPlease
From hundreds of parcel cage losses to zero in a matter of months
The Thinxtra 0G Network provides CouriersPlease with nationwide, low-cost, low-energy device connectivity. These features make it an ideal network for transmitting the small bytes of data CP needed to identify the location of each parcel cage. Additionally, every pre-configured Thinxtra device has a battery life of more than five years, removing the need for ongoing maintenance and associated costs for the device’s lifetime.
CouriersPlease expects all units will be connected and send location information from the parcel cages to a centralised dashboard where CouriersPlease can see the location of each cage in real-time.
While any IoT implementation is different for every company, CouriersPlease is eager to dispel the notion that it’s unnecessary or too expensive. In the future, CouriersPlease will extend its IoT tracking solution to other parts of its business.
By digitalising its services with efficient, low-power IoT sensors connected to the Thinxtra 0G Network, CouriersPlease has bolstered its business to support the growing number of Australians shopping online and removing the risks of asset management. With our Optus partnership, we're enabling real-time visibility for CouriersPlease's national network. The solution ensures its high-value cages aren't left unseen, lost, or stolen after transit by franchises and delivery partners.
Nicholas Lambrou,
Chief Executive Officer at Thinxtra
About CouriersPlease
CouriersPlease is Australia’s leading franchised parcel delivery service, generating innovative solutions to deliver more efficient and affordable last-mile deliveries designed to provide your business with a competitive advantage. As a fully owned subsidiary of Singapore Post, we’ve combined 160-years of innovative mail and logistics solutions with 35 years in the Australian freight industry to provide a truly rewarding consumer experience.
For more information, please visit the CouriersPlease website.
