Today, it's not uncommon for many companies to claim to provide platforms for fully automated document factories that simplify manual tasks, increase process efficiency and unify multi-site operations. In reality, though, some only work for print, while others only automate mail. What if you need both?
Automated document factories have been streamlining mail operations for well over a decade, and for good reason. Adopting factory production techniques can reduce costs, improve productivity and integrity, minimize errors, improve asset utilization and help meet service level agreements.
Given these benefits, more and more vendors are promoting products that claim to deliver fully automated ADF capabilities. Many do a good job of automating certain aspects of the print-to-mail process, but the operative phrase is "certain aspects." Unlike a "true" end-to-end ADF platform, point solutions only address discrete areas of the mail stream. Is that sufficient in today's environment?
As you consider expanding your ADF, know your requirements. Do you only want to automate print production? Or do you need to track and automate finishing, sorting and mailing too? After all, most documents have to be finished and distributed in some way. Consider the former. How many operations do you know that print transactional documents and then stop?
Once documents are printed in the "factory," then what? Halting tracking and alerts after printing is akin to a car manufacturer not monitoring a single process or function on the factory floor once the frame of the car is painted. This leaves the process exposed to missed steps and undetected problems and delays. And just as a car has many more process steps before completion, few transactional documents will pass through an operation without being finished and distributed in some way. That said, the ideal ADF solution tracks, manages and automates across the entire process, monitoring all of the gaps effectively by linking print and mail.
What to Look for
Unlike partial solutions, a true end-to-end ADF solution can help organizations better understand what's going on through all stages of the production print and mail lifecycle. A fully automated platform not only supports multiple application types and printstreams, it manages diverse printer platforms and environments,
makes better use of assets and balances workloads. In addition, it helps address mail processing challenges like meeting SLAs, improving mail integrity and compliance, tracking through sort as well as reducing costs, especially postage.
There are many downsides to implementing multiple point solutions. Issues run the gamut from duplicate investments; incompatibilities that create custody gaps rather than filling them; lack of integration that requires extensive professional services, time and expenses; production bottlenecks; and costly inefficiencies that can go undetected.
A 360-degree View
As in the previous example, producing an automobile combines several complex steps and some 20,000 individual components. Not surprisingly, managing the complex process chain that transforms huge coils of sheet metal, an engine, transmission and drive train and dozens of other components into a finished product is a daunting task - one that is typically very intelligent, highly automated and tightly linked.
Producing, finishing and distributing millions of mailpieces can be similarly complex. An ADF platform that links print and mail offers a 360-degree view of activities happening across the mail operation, from the moment a job is received to when it is inserted, sorted and prepared for mailing. With a centralized dashboard, you can close the gaps and manage all aspects of your operation tracking - not just printing and finishing, but sorting as well. What's more, you can streamline delivery across multiple channels, including surface mail and e-delivery.
Mailpiece Integrity
Ensuring mailpiece integrity is essential to keeping quality and customer satisfaction high. A true ADF solution improves process, job and piece-level integrity across the entire mailpiece lifecycle. Applying barcodes, creating piece-level tracking files, indexing print files to optimize processing integrity and ensuring regulatory compliance are all in the mix. Look for output management solutions that can use and enhance print files to help improve finishing operations as well as finishing solutions that can leverage these enhancements to enable automation, closed-loop reprinting, tracking and job reconciliation.
Tracking and Monitoring
With a comprehensive, integrated ADF solution (as opposed to a partial or point solution), a real-time command center allows you to track, monitor and control every mailpiece from arrival to sorting without burdening production with error-prone manual data entry every step of the way. This requires a system that automatically captures and consolidates information from multiple processing points and production sites to provide a "big picture" view of the entire production environment. As mail jobs move from acceptance to file conditioning, printing, inserting, sorting and delivery, you want to track each mailpiece through every process step with minimum operator overhead.
Automated Reprinting, Proof of Processes and Mailing
One of the pillars of the Toyota Production System is "jidoka." When a production problem occurs, the equipment immediately stops to prevent defective products from being produced. The same philosophy drives the end-to-end automated document factory. For example, when documents are damaged during printing or inserting, the affected page or pages must be reprinted. Through close integration with printers and finishing equipment, an intelligent finishing system can automatically detect and handle printer backspaces without stopping production, and an automated reprint system can determine which mailpieces are damaged in finishing and automatically regenerate them locally in the print operation for fast turnaround.
Unlike point solutions, an integrated ADF solution automatically captures production intelligence through sortation. Need proof of process? The system should be able to capture envelope images at sorting for end-to-end mailstream visibility. Instant access to in-process and recently mailed communications enables you to automatically construct a history of events for individual mailpieces. Online access to mailpiece status minimizes the number of inquiries received, making it easier to resolve inquiries quickly.
Creating and Modifying Documents on the Fly
Whether you're migrating black and white applications to color, using remnant white space to create a TransPromo document or moving, adding or deleting barcodes, the ability to create and modify documents without impacting the original application is a must. A fully automated ADF platform starts with a robust output management solution that supports multiple application types, a variety of print streams while managing diverse printer platforms and environments. It will support these capabilities and more in one agile integrated workflow, allowing you to re-engineer the printstream itself to extend the life of legacy documents.
Integrating the Intelligent Mail Barcode and TransPromo
Two recent developments are impacting mail operations in a big way - the Intelligent Mail Barcode and TransPromo communications. Transitioning to either requires a fairly sophisticated infrastructure and additional resources, which is where a true ADF shines. For the Intelligent Mail barcode, the transition can mean modifying document composition, converting printstreams and re-engineering mail preparation processes. An ADF can simplify creation and management, enabling you to replace older barcodes with the Intelligent Mail barcode without having to go back upstream and make changes to the host application.
For TransPromo applications, an ADF enables you to transform documents without disrupting your document composition processes, while improving integrity processing for intelligent finishing and reprinting. Meanwhile, high-integrity processing ensures that the right information is sent to the right customer at the right time. With the right infrastructure, you can add value to documents and enrich customer relationships by dynamically adding data-driven text, images and even additional insert pages into print-ready applications.
A True, End-to-End ADF Solution
Just as highly automated automobile production facilities use specially developed IT and logistics systems to streamline production and quality of automobiles, a true ADF solution tracks and automates every workflow step, linking both print and mail.
Peter D'Amato is the Vice President of Global Marketing and Product Management for Output Management and Automated Document Factory Solutions (ADF) at Pitney Bowes. Peter is responsible for the Production Intelligence Solution Suite, including the Emtex software products VIP, VDE and Flexserver, and the DFWorks ADF information management system. Peter has been with Pitney Bowes for over 17 years and has hosted numerous industry webinars on topics such as the Intelligent Mail barcode, high-integrity mail processing and TransPromo implementation strategies. Previously, Peter had both engineering and sales responsibilities for automated control and data acquisition systems with G.E. Power Systems. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering and an M.B.A. in Marketing, both from the University of Bridgeport.
Automated document factories have been streamlining mail operations for well over a decade, and for good reason. Adopting factory production techniques can reduce costs, improve productivity and integrity, minimize errors, improve asset utilization and help meet service level agreements.
Given these benefits, more and more vendors are promoting products that claim to deliver fully automated ADF capabilities. Many do a good job of automating certain aspects of the print-to-mail process, but the operative phrase is "certain aspects." Unlike a "true" end-to-end ADF platform, point solutions only address discrete areas of the mail stream. Is that sufficient in today's environment?
As you consider expanding your ADF, know your requirements. Do you only want to automate print production? Or do you need to track and automate finishing, sorting and mailing too? After all, most documents have to be finished and distributed in some way. Consider the former. How many operations do you know that print transactional documents and then stop?
Once documents are printed in the "factory," then what? Halting tracking and alerts after printing is akin to a car manufacturer not monitoring a single process or function on the factory floor once the frame of the car is painted. This leaves the process exposed to missed steps and undetected problems and delays. And just as a car has many more process steps before completion, few transactional documents will pass through an operation without being finished and distributed in some way. That said, the ideal ADF solution tracks, manages and automates across the entire process, monitoring all of the gaps effectively by linking print and mail.
What to Look for
Unlike partial solutions, a true end-to-end ADF solution can help organizations better understand what's going on through all stages of the production print and mail lifecycle. A fully automated platform not only supports multiple application types and printstreams, it manages diverse printer platforms and environments,
makes better use of assets and balances workloads. In addition, it helps address mail processing challenges like meeting SLAs, improving mail integrity and compliance, tracking through sort as well as reducing costs, especially postage.
There are many downsides to implementing multiple point solutions. Issues run the gamut from duplicate investments; incompatibilities that create custody gaps rather than filling them; lack of integration that requires extensive professional services, time and expenses; production bottlenecks; and costly inefficiencies that can go undetected.
A 360-degree View
As in the previous example, producing an automobile combines several complex steps and some 20,000 individual components. Not surprisingly, managing the complex process chain that transforms huge coils of sheet metal, an engine, transmission and drive train and dozens of other components into a finished product is a daunting task - one that is typically very intelligent, highly automated and tightly linked.
Producing, finishing and distributing millions of mailpieces can be similarly complex. An ADF platform that links print and mail offers a 360-degree view of activities happening across the mail operation, from the moment a job is received to when it is inserted, sorted and prepared for mailing. With a centralized dashboard, you can close the gaps and manage all aspects of your operation tracking - not just printing and finishing, but sorting as well. What's more, you can streamline delivery across multiple channels, including surface mail and e-delivery.
Mailpiece Integrity
Ensuring mailpiece integrity is essential to keeping quality and customer satisfaction high. A true ADF solution improves process, job and piece-level integrity across the entire mailpiece lifecycle. Applying barcodes, creating piece-level tracking files, indexing print files to optimize processing integrity and ensuring regulatory compliance are all in the mix. Look for output management solutions that can use and enhance print files to help improve finishing operations as well as finishing solutions that can leverage these enhancements to enable automation, closed-loop reprinting, tracking and job reconciliation.
Tracking and Monitoring
With a comprehensive, integrated ADF solution (as opposed to a partial or point solution), a real-time command center allows you to track, monitor and control every mailpiece from arrival to sorting without burdening production with error-prone manual data entry every step of the way. This requires a system that automatically captures and consolidates information from multiple processing points and production sites to provide a "big picture" view of the entire production environment. As mail jobs move from acceptance to file conditioning, printing, inserting, sorting and delivery, you want to track each mailpiece through every process step with minimum operator overhead.
Automated Reprinting, Proof of Processes and Mailing
One of the pillars of the Toyota Production System is "jidoka." When a production problem occurs, the equipment immediately stops to prevent defective products from being produced. The same philosophy drives the end-to-end automated document factory. For example, when documents are damaged during printing or inserting, the affected page or pages must be reprinted. Through close integration with printers and finishing equipment, an intelligent finishing system can automatically detect and handle printer backspaces without stopping production, and an automated reprint system can determine which mailpieces are damaged in finishing and automatically regenerate them locally in the print operation for fast turnaround.
Unlike point solutions, an integrated ADF solution automatically captures production intelligence through sortation. Need proof of process? The system should be able to capture envelope images at sorting for end-to-end mailstream visibility. Instant access to in-process and recently mailed communications enables you to automatically construct a history of events for individual mailpieces. Online access to mailpiece status minimizes the number of inquiries received, making it easier to resolve inquiries quickly.
Creating and Modifying Documents on the Fly
Whether you're migrating black and white applications to color, using remnant white space to create a TransPromo document or moving, adding or deleting barcodes, the ability to create and modify documents without impacting the original application is a must. A fully automated ADF platform starts with a robust output management solution that supports multiple application types, a variety of print streams while managing diverse printer platforms and environments. It will support these capabilities and more in one agile integrated workflow, allowing you to re-engineer the printstream itself to extend the life of legacy documents.
Integrating the Intelligent Mail Barcode and TransPromo
Two recent developments are impacting mail operations in a big way - the Intelligent Mail Barcode and TransPromo communications. Transitioning to either requires a fairly sophisticated infrastructure and additional resources, which is where a true ADF shines. For the Intelligent Mail barcode, the transition can mean modifying document composition, converting printstreams and re-engineering mail preparation processes. An ADF can simplify creation and management, enabling you to replace older barcodes with the Intelligent Mail barcode without having to go back upstream and make changes to the host application.
For TransPromo applications, an ADF enables you to transform documents without disrupting your document composition processes, while improving integrity processing for intelligent finishing and reprinting. Meanwhile, high-integrity processing ensures that the right information is sent to the right customer at the right time. With the right infrastructure, you can add value to documents and enrich customer relationships by dynamically adding data-driven text, images and even additional insert pages into print-ready applications.
A True, End-to-End ADF Solution
Just as highly automated automobile production facilities use specially developed IT and logistics systems to streamline production and quality of automobiles, a true ADF solution tracks and automates every workflow step, linking both print and mail.
Peter D'Amato is the Vice President of Global Marketing and Product Management for Output Management and Automated Document Factory Solutions (ADF) at Pitney Bowes. Peter is responsible for the Production Intelligence Solution Suite, including the Emtex software products VIP, VDE and Flexserver, and the DFWorks ADF information management system. Peter has been with Pitney Bowes for over 17 years and has hosted numerous industry webinars on topics such as the Intelligent Mail barcode, high-integrity mail processing and TransPromo implementation strategies. Previously, Peter had both engineering and sales responsibilities for automated control and data acquisition systems with G.E. Power Systems. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering and an M.B.A. in Marketing, both from the University of Bridgeport.
