Member Article

Ubisense strengthens success in the East

Based in Cambridge, UK, Ubisense is an innovator of Enterprise Location Intelligence products and solutions. Its suite of products accurately captures and interprets data from mobile tags via a network of base stations, arming its customers with superior operational visibility. These enable businesses across the high value manufacturing, utility and telecommunications sectors to make significant improvements in efficiency.

Knowledge is power

Ubisense products have a vast number of applications and can improve decision making, automate processes to reduce errors, or, in certain industries, meet lean production targets. Automotive manufacturers, for example, are able to implement a tag-automated system which tracks vehicles on the production line. “This information allows the manufacturer to adjust processes that improve cost efficiency, potentially saving millions of pounds over the course of the year,” adds Paul Webster VP of Hardware, Ubisense. Factories employing this technology have since been dubbed ‘smart factories’ and Paul estimates that already 4% of the world’s cars are now built with the assistance of an Ubisense solution. This represents five of the 10 largest global car manufacturers, and the number of deployments is increasing every year.

Location, Location, Location

Being located in Cambridge is hugely advantageous to the business, and indeed the four founders initially met while working at a research facility affiliated with the world-renowned Cambridge University. “As a city, Cambridge provides a unique infrastructure formed over the last 50 years by generations of entrepreneurs,” explains Paul. “Offering support and expertise – as well as capital – these Angel investors are on hand to guide and develop the next generation of start-ups.”

From Silicon Fen to the world…

With 500 customers across 50 countries, and with 95% of what it builds being exported, Ubisense has experienced phenomenal growth since it launched in 2002.

With a variety of blue-chip companies in fast-moving, high-value industries as customers, Ubisense must be in a position to fulfil orders as quickly as possible. “If these companies need additional hardware to support their own increased production, we need to make sure it gets there on time,” says Paul. “This is especially true in the manufacturing sector where, more often than not, delays to production are so costly that they are simply not an option. That’s why FedEx has played such an integral role to our global success.”

Global support, local knowledge

Ubisense first approached FedEx Express in 2004 due to its global reach and reputation for reliability and the relationship has grown into an integrated partnership moving thousands of packages all across the globe. These packages range from large palletised shipments containing everything required to deploy a system across a complete manufacturing facility, down to the smaller urgent packages that ensure these systems keep running 24/7 to support ongoing production.

As Paul explains, “FedEx is extremely supportive and helpful – facilitating last minute shipments when needed. Their advanced customer technology tools and global customs expertise is central making sure this happens every time.”

Coming to a location near you

Ubisense is now attracting a great deal of interest from the East, notably Japan and Korea as well as from China, the largest manufacturer of automobiles in the world. “Working with FedEx gives us the opportunity to be flexible as we develop,” says Paul. “That’s especially true when it comes to entering new markets that may have different customs procedures. Having local, global knowledge on tap will continue to be extremely useful as we continue to expand.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ubisense .