Introducing ARC, ChargeItSpot’s New Mobile Device Management Locker

January 13, 2022

Throughout 2021, global supply chain issues were undoubtedly one of the greatest topics of discussion and debate in the news. And while the connection between phone charging and supply chains may not be, on the surface, an obvious one, ChargeItSpot has uncovered the surprisingly large impact that mobile devices have on a company’s logistics cost and performance. Following in-depth interviews with our retail clients and an internal case study, we’ve pinpointed poor mobile device management (aka, “MDM”) as one of the little-known underlying factors behind supply chain bottlenecks today.

From retail to warehousing, an increasing number of industries depend on the availability and proper functionality of company-owned mobile devices (smartphones, but also PoS devices, RF scanners, tablets, etc.) for maximum efficiency and productivity. We discovered that inefficient mobile device management led to 20% annual device shrink or theft. What’s more, over 1,000 hours per year, per location were being consumed by the manual process to manage/monitor these devices. And while many companies are implementing BYOD – or Bring Your Own Device – policies, the security and reliability concerns associated with BYOD often outweigh its potential benefits. 

Solutions to effectively manage company-owned devices in the workplace are few and far between. A recent Samsung report, authored by Oxford Economics, found that nearly 80% of IT executives said employees cannot do their jobs effectively without a mobile device, and three-quarters said mobile devices were “essential” to workflows. Enter ARC, the new mobile device management system created by ChargeItSpot, the leading provider of phone charging stations for retailers and public venues. The ARC locker system consists of a self-service touchscreen kiosk, with expandable modular locker banks and a cloud-based management platform. ARC is programmed to release the mobile device with the most charge, alert managers when a device has not been returned, and allow employees to flag damaged devices so they don’t go back into circulation and can be repaired.

By installing ARC locker systems in warehouses, distribution centers, and retail stores, companies can minimize loss and theft of their employee’s mobile devices and optimize productivity and time management by ensuring that devices are always fully charged and operating with full functionality. 

Powersports retailer Comoto Holdings, one of the companies piloting the ARC locker system, was faced with numerous supply chain problems stemming from inefficient mobile device management. “Multiple people would use any given device, which resulted in devices not being charged completely, leading to down time, swaps, lost and broken devices with no one being notified, and scanners getting unpaired,” revealed Christopher Sterling, the fulfillment center manager at Comoto. “A team lead spends a good portion of their day messing with these devices as opposed to doing anything else more productive.” 

Another advantage provided by the ARC mobile device management locker system is accountability. ARC contains an audit trail for device check-ins, effectively preventing employees from checking out a second device before having returned the first one. Broken or faulty mobile devices are also kept from circulating – unless it’s been cleared by a supervising manager. 

In a pilot study conducted at Comoto’s warehouse, ARC’s positive impacts were recorded within weeks of installation. The time a manager spent on routine mobile device management dropped by 97%, the time spent swapping out faulty or dying mobile devices diminished by 67%, and device shrink was reduced by a whopping 100%!

At a time when minimizing friction in the global supply chain is of the utmost importance, ARC is a welcome solution to the painful, long-standing problem of MDM for businesses who distribute company-owned devices to their employees.

Discover ARC in person at NRF 2022 and MODEX 2022. Follow us on social media @arc_kiosk for details and booth information.