RLA Takes initiative in Organizing Digital Transformation Roundtable

By Tony Sciarrotta, Reverse Logistics Association

A Council of Councils has been created, an association of associations, to lead the way to digital transformation of the reverse logistics industry. The new roundtable came together while sequestered during the Covid-19 pandemic and is focused on the Circular Economy. Fourteen separate organizations have come together to discuss ways they could work together and share information about their respective technology initiates and interests. Initially their focus is on emerging blockchain initiatives. Many of the fourteen associations are exploring various approaches to this emerging technology. Why should their efforts be coordinated? What can be done to reduce a duplication of effort? How can there by interoperability?

They met a second time a month later, and now eighteen different associations participated. The benefits for such a Roundtable are obvious. At the second meeting, Nadia Hewett of the World Economic Forum spoke about her work on Blockchain interoperability.

The effort was dubbed The Digital Transformation Roundtable after a poll taken by |Dr. Ron Lembke, Chair, Managerial Sciences at the University of Nevada (Reno) who hosted and moderated the meetings. The idea came from Patrick Duffy, President of BITA (the Blockchain in Transportation Alliance) who suggested jokingly that a council of councils would be helpful to keep us from reinventing wheels. BITA is conducting a pilot project at this time in Canada with their project to digitize transportation documentation. In a mutual exchange of ideas with the Reverse Logistics Association, Bruce Brown demonstrated the RLA labeling protocols with a single QR code that contained an entire Bill of Lading Form. “Wow!” commented Mr. Duffy, “how many other initiates are there in our industry? Why aren’t we working together more?”

Ken Jacobsen, co-chair of the RLA Standards Committee heard that and took it as a challenge. He had been in dialog with other trade associations and institutes about a new initiative from the RLA to create a blockchain for for refurbished electronics—a CarFax™ for refurbished computers, if you will. Cory Dehmey of R2/SERI expressed interest and so did Rohi Sukhia, President of OBADA (the Open Blockchain Asset Disposition Architecture). They are working on an ISO standard for blockchain interoperability that many organizations are supporting. Mr. Sukhia noted, “interoperability is the key to the success of any blockchain project and the goal of all standards.”

It should be noted: The Reverse Logistics Association has played a critical role in the formation of this group: Dr. Lembke and Mr. Jacobsen are co-chairs of the RLA Standards Committee. It was their initiative that organized this event. The RLA Standards Committee developed and now manages the labeling protocols (ANSI MH10.8.2.!2N) that will enable this dream of interoperability. Our 12N standard allow one label to contain links to multiple blockchains. The 12N standard optimizes the use of up to 4000 characters in multiple fields with multiple URLS in a single label accessed with a single scan. If you would like more information on this, please contact either Dr. Lembke ronlembke@unr.edu or Ken Jacobsen ken@jacobsen46.com

A list of the initial associations involved is in the following chart.

In 2016, Tony took over the Reverse Logistics Association and became the Executive Director and Publisher after 12 years of active involvement on the Advisory Board and on Committees. Tony has held various industry positions including 15 years in returns management at Philips. During his Philips years, Tony developed new reverse logistics strategies and implemented many new returns initiatives. He worked with retail partners and industry groups on best practices still being used. Tony then became an evangelist for improving the customer experience to reduce returns and their associated costs. Today, Tony is considered a subject matter expert in reverse logistics and speaks for the industry at conferences all over the world.