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Case Study: Real-Time Supply Chain Visibility Reduces Failure Rate and Costs

Live from Philadelphia’s Global Cold Chain Forum, a speaker explains how DHL implemented an active container to halt failures and ultimately scale back on container costs.

When DHL came to Sonoco Thermosafe approximately 18 months ago, they were seeking help for one of their customers. A global biopharma company was experiencing a high product failure rate upon active shipment—in the 90 days leading up to the container change, they had a one in five failure rate from mechanical and temperature issues.

 

As Chris Day, Director of Global Business Development at Sonoco Thermosafe, explained at the IQPC Global Cold Chain Forum Sep. 25, “It was to the point where if they needed six containers, they would order seven,” due to the lack of reliability. The company was incurring substantial costs through lost or quarantined product and cancelled cargo bookings.

 

The failure rate came with additional issues: the average investigation time for deviations was 28 days because the company had to wait for the shipping container to return in order to pull data. 

 

DHL selected PharmaPort 360, an active container with real-time monitoring and tracking capabilities and a proprietary heating and cooling system. Day pointed out that DHL has invested heavily in their temperature-controlled service offerings. Once they implemented PharmaPort, they were able to collect extensive data: internal and ambient, location and mechanical, which includes battery life and thermal systems.

 

(The system uses cell phone networks with GPS/GSM and sends data in real-time. During flight and in vaulted facilities, the system gathers data without sending it. When the container moves out of the airspace or vaulted area, it batch transmits the collected data.)

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