Progress Software Boosts Portland Fish Exchange

04/20/2009

Progress Software Corporation (NASDAQ: PRGS), a global provider of application infrastructure software to develop, deploy, integrate and manage business applications, announced today that the Portland Fish Exchange (PFEX) has put into operation America’s first online, all-display, fresh seafood auction system based on Progress® technology. Progress Application Partner, DC Systems, is helping reel in about 90 percent of the ten to fifteen million pounds of fish (i.e., Cod, Pollock, and Flounder) harvested in Maine annually by automating the Portland Fish Exchange’s inventory management by using bar-code scanning.

ebizQ received the following:

Portland Fish Exchange, which is owned by the city of Portland in Maine, has deployed DC Systems' seafood inventory system, SeaTrak®, which automates inventory management by bar-coding every fish container and provides real-time views into their daily auction. An additional application, the DC Systems Auctioneer, links to SeaTrak and provides the capability to execute Internet-based auctions.

DC Systems built their SeaTrak application using the Progress OpenEdge ® application development platform and the Progress SonicMQ ® standards-based enterprise messaging system. The application directs the flow of goods throughout a fresh fish facility using barcode labels and wireless networking technology.

Bert Jongerden, General Manager of the Portland Fish Exchange said: "Our legacy inventory application is a leader in the fishing industry, but it never provided us the productivity gains we wanted by eliminating pen and paper on the piers and manual data entry. We also needed a better way to manage our inventory and share that information with buyers and sellers, and we wanted to expand our market by creating daily online auctions. The Portland Fish Exchange has realized tremendous productivity gains from its investment in our new inventory management and auctioning system, and we expect an accelerated return on investment with a full payback.”

The deployment of this new system reduces errors in fish data collection, and allows workers to unload the catch from the ship, sort the fish more efficiently, and quickly stage the fish in the warehouse prior to auction. And by putting its auction online, Portland Fish Exchange is positioned to reach buyers beyond its primary market of New England and throughout the eastern United States.

Jongerden continued: “Manually entering data at a pier has been an error-prone process. DC Systems understood our data collection, communications, inventory and warehousing needs and proposed an innovative solution that was very appealing to us. This new bar coding system not only saved us tens of thousands of dollars in capital equipment purchases, it also allowed us to enhance our data collection accuracy and increase employee productivity. Employees never have to touch a keyboard to enter information, and they can do their jobs on the docks without worrying about keying in data.”

Daily fish auctions are held at the Portland Fish Exchange, and buyers ‘tunnel’ into a Virtual Private Network (VPN) using thin clients communicating via the SonicMQ messaging system. Sellers have the option of accepting or declining bid prices or selling fish privately, and when this occurs, the Portland Fish Exchange can easily account for lots removed from the auction. Equally, buyers representing restaurants can go online and select the fish they want from the comfort of their offices with the confidence of obtaining quality grading information via SeaTrak.

Jongerden commented: “Progress Software and its partner, DC Systems, were able to take our vision and construct an impressive technology platform.”

DC Systems tailored and deployed the system for Portland Fish Exchange so that workers can quickly sort fish by species and size, weigh them, print bar code labels for each container, and scan the labels into inventory. The scanners and scales send real-time messages to the SeaTrak system and inventory is scanned as it is moved from the docks to the refrigerated warehouse. The containers of fish are then moved off the piers onto a staging floor and a processing room. All movements throughout the workflow are tracked using messages sent using the SonicMQ messaging system and the SeaTrak system based on OpenEdge technology. Fish Graders assess the quality of each lot of fish and this information is also stored in SeaTrak and available to approved buyers online.

According to David Ireland, executive vice president, Progress Software: "Inventory management is a critical success factor for many industries, and automation of the Portland Fish Exchange makes the whole auction process more efficient for buyers and sellers. The SeaTrak application, powered by Progress technologies, enables the Portland Fish Exchange to efficiently manage inventory and Auctioneer has allowed the organization to successfully move its daily auction online and explore new market opportunities.”

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