Canadian operator Rogers for Business and Roambee, an on-demand logistics visibility company, have entered into a strategic collaboration to provide businesses in Canada with real-time monitoring for shipments and assets. With Covid-19 continuing to have an impact on the shipment of goods across borders, this collaboration uses IoT technologies to give businesses greater ability to view and monitor their goods and assets and more control over their supply chains.

Roambee’s platform provides businesses with insights into their supply chain with the ability to track their goods in real-time, detect security breaches and enable the recovery of missing or stolen assets and goods. Businesses will also be able to monitor inventory levels to eliminate shortages and excess goods.

With this announcement, Rogers said it continues to meet the needs of Canadian businesses and municipalities and expand its portfolio of IoT products, from vehicles and operations to networks and civic engagement.

Tarifica’s Take

As the pandemic continues and its impact on businesses deepens, Rogers’ business division has worked with a technology partner to offer something that is truly value-added. While we have written rather extensively lately about the effect of Covid-19 on consumers’ relationships to mobile services and their providers, the pandemic has affected large enterprises in a particular way that can be addressed: It has reduced the number of employees that can be working on-site and therefore made it more difficult for companies not only to manufacture goods but also to observe and control those that they do manufacture after they leave the factory.

When it comes to shipments, supply chains and control systems (for example, cold chains for the food and pharmaceutical industries), IoT is excellently well adapted to give managers the powers of visibility and control. With personnel reduced by the pandemic’s strictures, enhanced use of IoT will allow companies to keep track of shipment, inventory, and supply chains in both directions, in real time. It is particularly appropriate for a mobile operator such as Rogers Business to offer these services, as it not only provides the required connectivity but also has pre-existing relationships with the enterprise customers. From the customer point of view, Rogers is an entity they can trust, and from the technology partner’s point of view, Rogers is well positioned to bring Roambee’s platform to a larger group of clients than otherwise would be possible. From Rogers’ point of view, the offering is an opportunity to derive revenue while helping businesses through the difficult times of the pandemic.