| Written by Mathias Pötter
There is a haystack, and then there is a needle. You don't need to hear more to understand the challenge of giant car terminals, aren't you? Several thousand vehicles, parked in lines and rows, polished and clean, advertised by second-hand car dealers. Cars waiting to get visited and picked up by future buyers, the valuable, vacant space replenished as soon as possible. Space is money, and so time is. A car dealer's yard is a place of continuous movement.
The goal: excellent customer experience
How does a used car is sold these days? It all begins online. Marketplaces and large platforms dominate the online market in general, and it is no different to car dealers. Potential buyers love to have an enormous selection. This is the USP of large car dealers who can offer "everything for everyone", and they will try everything to show you your cars in their yard as well.
Typically, you will bookmark offers, print them out or book them online for a later visit. Everything is at your fingertips: costs, driven kilometres, horsepower, colour, and initial registration. You are ready to go because you like the cars and you love the experience with the website.
the way: process visibility everywhere
Once you arrive at the car dealer for your booked appointment, you are ready to rock'n roll. You enter the building, tell the clerk your name, and she finds your appointment immediately in the system. All four cars are still available. You get the keys, and some instructions on what to do and what not. She takes a cheap paper copy of the yard map and explains in which zone your cars are parked. You nod, and off you are. Seven minutes later, in the middle of several thousand cars and signposts, you take a deep breath. You are lost, you know it, and you are annoyed to walk back to the office and ask for help. Your initial trust in this car dealer vanishes. If they can't manage the parking of their cars, how do they manage the functional capability? You are shaking your head, remember the other advertisement from another dealer and get your phone out. You will be there in fifteen minutes (read more about RTLS and RFID)
the missing link to full digitalisation: Asset agent
The process at the second car dealer starts the same. But instead of a not helpful map, you get the current parking position of your car. As you walk out to the dedicated parking zone, you click the button of the transponder the clerk gave you with the keys, and you immediately see the car's red light blinking. You found it with no time lost. That worked like a charm, you sit in the car, start the engine, drive a couple of rounds within the giant yard and park the car at one of the empty parking spaces. A car dealer's yard is a place of continuous movement.
The centrepiece of this magic is Asset Agent. Asset Agent is a multi-functional transponder that is temporarily positioned on every vehicle and enables a real-time locating system (RTLS). When a "new" car arrives at the yard, the transponder is hung onto the inside mirror and the car gets associated with the transponder automatically. From this moment on, each vehicle movement is tracked. Every new parking position will be automatically reported to the system and is visible to the clerk and the visitor. All the time. If a car needs to be picked up or moved, an integrated LED in the transponder can initiate a flashing light for fast and easy identification of the right vehicle.
Do you want to learn more about Asset Agent' RTLS?
Extended reading: Real-time locating system and industry 4.0
