For 160 years, Singapore Post Limited (SingPost) has been the country’s postal service provider. Moving away from an era of snail mail, SingPost has been championing innovative mail and logistics solutions in Singapore and around the world.
In its latest announcement, the postal service provider will be introducing artificial intelligence (AI) to its next-generation regional logistics platform Last Mile Platform (LaMP). This will provide the organisation with unprecedented parcel traceability and reliability for customers across Southeast Asia.
New Lights with LaMP
LaMP is SingPost’s latest proprietary logistics software. A first-of-its-kind, the technology consolidates various last-mile delivery services, such as courier services, parcel lockers, brick-and-mortar collection points, onto a single platform. Since LaMP is technology agnostic, services from several providers can be integrated. This gives both consumers and eCommerce retailers convenience like never before.
Additionally, LaMP is location-agnostic. Thus, the platform connects last-mile partner services across the Southeast Asian region. Retailers can then offer customers the ability to receive online purchases via any last-mile delivery node in the network within any country in Southeast Asia. Moreover, consumers may redirect en-route deliveries to an alternate delivery node on the platform is and when required.
Enhancing with AI in Snail Mail
With AI, the benefits of the platform will be enhanced further.
LaMP will use machine learning and AI route planning software from LogiNext, a cloud-based logistics optimisation company. This will give LaMP the ability to autonomously plot optimised courier delivery routes based. Multiple factors are taken into consideration here. This includes parcel destinations, customer preferences (for example, “blackout” or preferred times for delivery), and real-time ground data such as traffic and weather conditions. These functions will apply to all Southeast Asia markets covered by LaMP.
The software is able to analyse and proactively alert all stakeholders on courier movements. Through this capability, customers can receive an alert thirty minutes prior to their parcel’s arrival. This is a significant improvement in terms of convenience.
AI for a Better World
For highly urbanised and dense cities like Bangkok and Jarkata, the technology will make a world of difference. In these cities, customers typically are provided with vague parcel arrival times because of uncontrollable factors like traffic congestion and extreme weather conditions. Thanks to the new technology, these factors will be dealt with from a single screen called the control tower. The control tower provides end-to-end visibility connecting multiple GPS tracking systems and APIs.
“At SingPost, we are great believers in using the latest technologies to improve customer experience. The introduction of AI into our next-generation LaMP platform will augment its already-considerable capabilities, translating to unprecedented convenience for our customers,” said Alex Tan, SingPost Group Chief Digital and Technology Officer.
“Our delivery route planning engine is the leading benchmarker in the industry. Couriers have much better-planned routes, so they can handle more parcels. It’s a win-win for everyone, SingPost raises its already high delivery agility and the customer gets a much better experience with it,” said LogiNext CEO Dhruvil Sanghvi.
SingPost and LogiNext are in the midst of integrating the route planning AI software into LaMP, and the integration is expected to be complete next year.