Fonterra standardises barcoding systems for its global operations

Fonterra has signed an agreement for SATO to provide supplies, services and support for barcode systems in the dairy cooperative’s factories and distribution centres worldwide.

“The agreement for SATO to extend its services worldwide is a natural extension to the great work Sato has already done for us in New Zealand and Australia standardising our systems and processes, and we believe that this will help improve the end user experience and our operational performance globally,” Mike Saint, IT service owner for Fonterra, says in a statement.

“SATO is an integral solutions partner of Fonterra and we rely on their responsive support, technical expertise and extensive knowledge in the automatic identification and data capture solutions domain. This, coupled with SATO’s worldwide footprint, made the choice to use SATO the logical choice, based on their common values and their approach to deeper customer and user engagement.”

Fonterra, a global, co-operatively-owned company, produces 22 billion litres of milk and two million tonnes of dairy ingredients, speciality ingredients and consumer products every year. Ninety-five per cent of this output is exported to the global market, while the remaining 5 per cent stays locally.

It is the second biggest ICT-using organisation in New Zealand in the 2014 CIO100.

SATO says it has been working closely with Fonterra in New Zealand and Australia, in standardising the dairy giant’s barcoding systems and configurations.

Furthering this partnership, the two companies have signed an agreement that will cover all countries Fonterra operates in. This will likewise allow SATO’s global subsidiaries to better offer localised services to match the needs of Fonterra’s operations in each country.

Key applications under the agreement include product traceability systems, product anti-counterfeiting solutions, label management and printing solutions and wireless infrastructure solutions.

“We’re extremely excited that Fonterra, the world’s leading dairy exporter, has chosen Sato to offer our products and services throughout their entire supply chain, transitioning our long-term collaboration to a more robust alliance,” says Kaz Matsuyama, president and CEO of SATO.

“SATO will continue to enhance and expedite our globalisation strategies with specialist teams we have built to take care of global key accounts like Fonterra, and we are confident that this agreement represents an excellent opportunity to strengthen the win-win business relationship between both companies moving forward.”

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