Blog Post

StayLinked and OpalTec Partnership Ensures Supply Chain Industry’s Seamless Transition to 5G by Eliminating Connectivity Issues

As 5G adoption grows, StayLinked’s enterprise-grade terminal emulation (TE) software, SmartTE, in partnership with OpalTec, is ensuring that supply chain organizations and warehouse operations can fully maximize the technology advancements 5G delivers. As mobile devices move from one network to another, SmartTE enables these organizations to seamlessly overcome potential 5G and private-5G network connectivity issues.

“Even under today’s WLAN conditions, connection issues and dropped sessions, occur at an alarming rate. This results in a warehouse worker’s workflow being disrupted and often, completely lost,” explained Justin Griffith, StayLinked’s chief technology officer. “With the introduction of 5G and private-5G networks, connectivity issues are likely to increase leading to a further reduction in worker productivity and operational efficiency in warehouses. This not only wastes expensive IT resources as they try to resolve connection issues, but also worsens the worker experience.”

StayLinked and OpalTec Partnership Uniquely Addresses 5G Connectivity Issues in Warehouses. Unlike other terminal emulation software, StayLinked’s SmartTE uses a resident server to securely connect workers to the warehouse management system (WMS). This ensures session persistence and seamless connectivity, enhancing operational efficiency.

“With sessions residing on the StayLinked server and not on the worker’s mobile device, connectivity to the WMS remains uninterrupted even if connectivity issues arise, preventing dropped sessions,” continued Griffith. “A simple reconnect takes the worker back to exactly where they were in the workflow, with no data loss and no need to involve anyone from IT.”

5G connectivity issues are likely to be particularly prevalent for warehouse operations spread out over several buildings or where goods are stored outside, such as ports, timber yards, and railway yards.

“Having wasted a lot of time and effort trying to solve our connectivity issues with traditional TE software the issues remained unsolved,” said Rob McGregor, service desk IT manager for one of the UK’s major port groups, PD Ports. “StayLinked’s SmartTE worked immediately and all of our connectivity problems went away!”

The rise of 5G and private-5G networks could significantly increase connectivity issues, posing a huge challenge for supply chain organizations and warehouse operators. If these challenges are not addressed, they could prevent companies from benefiting from the giant leap forward in wireless communications that 5G offers.

Few words from our business development manager James Mellor about SmartTE

“SmartTE’s session persistence eliminates data loss and lost productivity by its elegant handling of mobile device roaming and connectivity between different networks,” said James Mellor, business development manager for StayLinked partner, OpalTec International Ltd. “It is a challenge which some supply chain organizations and warehouse operators do not understand can be easily solved by StayLinked and its enterprise-grade SmartTE software, which will enable them to take full advantage of 5G.”