Gebrüder Cox GmbH was established in 1988. It’s a medium-sized wholesaler for

pot plants and flowers, with 65 employees serving 3.000 customers in 7 Euro-

pean countries and a focus on Germany, The Netherlands, France and Italy.

Cox has subsidiaries in Lüllingen and Trier and is said to be the largest private

warehouse in Germany. Cox sells its products to florists, garden centers and

through various other dealers. In Geldern-Lüllungen, Cox offers 98.000 different

products on 6.000 square meters and has a daily turnover of 10.000 articles. Since

September 2008 the company has a second site in Trier with 2.000 square meters.

The sales is organized with auctions, mobile sales via trucks directly and the usual

sales in Trier and Lüllingen.

Case setting:

• Gebrüder Cox GmbH

• Germany

• Flower wholesales

• Partner AISCI Ident GmbH

• PA600

CaseStudy

www.ute.com

Unitech & Gebrüder Cox GmbH

Unitech eUropeKapitein hatterasstraat 19, 5015 BB tilburg, the netherlands t. +31.13.460 9292 e. info@eu.ute.com

head officetaipei, taiwanwww.ute.com

In order to reduce the customers’ time of waiting and to achieve higher figures in sales Cox opted for a new concept of mobile data transfer. AISCI Ident GmbH advised Cox and provided the necessary hardware. Important prerequisites of a suitable hardware solution were the ability to read barcodes, a WLAN and WWAN radio on board for immediate data transfer and a big screen to capture customer signatures. Unitech’s PA600 perfectly applied to these requirements. Thomas Behr, project manager at AISCI Ident GmbH explains: “The Unitech PA600 uses different kinds of wireless gadgets to connect to Cox’ ERP system. The direct data exchange guarantees a permanent and accurate position of the host system”. To improve the stock receiving, AISCI developed an individual mobile receiving terminal for Cox. In Lüllingen they now use two scales which use bar-code scanners, robust touch screen terminals for industry and two powerful label printers. The core element of the new system is a delivery note with a barcode, which the driver hands over together with the goods.

3. Benefits of the solution

This barcode contains all the necessary information, right from the start of order-ing. When receiving the goods, the barcode is scanned so the staff member can easily control the quantity and quality of the goods. The system recognizes and registers any discrepancies with the original order. The mobile sales staff of both subsidiaries of Cox is now able to connect to the central ERP system via WLAN in buildings. Also, due to the integrated WWAN module (GPRS/EDGE), mobile staff is able to make connections outside the four walls as well. The immediate data processing of each sale makes a subsequent handling error at the PC redundant. The length of order processes is shortened as well, since customers acknowledge deals immediately with a digital signature on the display, thus simplifying the whole process. Borg has been completely satisfied with this solution proposed by AISCI, making use of Unitech hardware. This good relationship runs for years now, making that Cox didn’t even consider other suppliers for this project.

1. Customer specific need

Large scale dealing in flowers and plants is subject to seasonal fluctua-tions. To perform business at best, Cox is dependent on an efficient and fault-less run of sales. The old system where sales people still worked with paper forms caused a lot of overhead, both in the field and in the back office depart-ments. Also, the process was very prone to error since each sale had to be docu-mented into central PC’s. Besides the sales part, Cox also faced issues in their stock receiving process. Delivery notes had to be processed into the central ERP system and then a label had to be print-ed, which was then used to store the good and prepare it for sales. This rather time consuming process also hindered staff to control the quality of the deliv-ered goods fast enough, although this is of utmost importance, as the quality is certified according to the ISO-standard. A consistent and exact assessment of the supplier is essential. Considering all these requirements the sales and stock processes of Cox had to be significantly altered. To do so, Cox joined forces with AISCI Ident GmbH and Unitech.

2. The solution by Unitech

“This perfectly helps to assess the quality and accuracy of our suppliers. Confusions are excluded and the receiving of goods is now fully automatic.”

Andreas Borg, Marketing and IT Manager at Cox.

Solution with product Mobile sales people scan barcodes on products of Cox by using the PA600 and transfer order information immediately to central ERP system by using WLAN or WWAN connection

Benefit 1 Operations possible both inside or outside the four walls

Benefit 2 Administrative error at the PC is redundant

Benefit 3 Shorter order process by capturing digital signatures