Every label applied. Every code read. Every unit accounted for.
ProVision Automation is Ahearn & Soper's line-side automation practice for Canadian warehouse and manufacturing lines. We specify, install and service label applicators, industrial scanning, RFID and voice-directed picking. One contract, one number when the line stops.
Identification is a loop, not a purchase
Most vendors sell you one stage of it. When something goes wrong, a skewed label, a no read at the sorter, a pallet that does not match its ASN, you get three suppliers pointing at each other while your line sits idle.
Ahearn & Soper supplies every stage. We manufacture the label, print it, apply it, verify it, track it, and direct the people working alongside it. When it breaks, there is nobody to argue with.
Four failures we get called about
Automation projects almost never start with a decision to automate. They start with one of these.
The labelling station sets the line speed
Two people at a hand labelling bench set the ceiling for everything upstream of them. You can add a shift, but you cannot add throughput. An applicator does not save labour, it removes the ceiling.
The chargebacks arrived
A retail or automotive customer found labels in the wrong place, the wrong orientation, or unreadable. Placement tolerance just stopped being a specification and became a P&L line.
You find out at their dock, not yours
Nothing verifies the label after it is applied. A misfeed, a low ribbon or a lifted corner ships out and comes back as a claim. Verification is cheap. The claim is not.
Your people are holding paper instead of product
Read a list, walk to a location, read a label, mark a line. Every one of those is a hand or an eye taken off the work, and a place an error gets in.
Five systems. One integrator.
Each one is specified, integrated, installed and serviced by the same team, so there is no handover between the machine, the label and the software.
Automated label applicators
For pre-printed labels at production speed.
Label-Aire wipe-on, tamp-blow, air-blow and corner-wrap primary applicators, plus LabelMill semi-automatic and conveyor systems. Round containers, flat panels, cases, pallets and pouches.
Print and apply systems
For variable data: barcodes, lot codes, dates, serials and GS1.
Label-Aire printer applicators and LabelMill print and apply systems with Zebra, SATO and Epson ColorWorks print engines. Tamp, smart-tamp, blow, flag, corner-wrap and pallet.
Fixed industrial scanning
Read every code, every time, without a person.
The Zebra FS series and the GS20 gateway, managed on the Zebra Aurora platform. From a plug-in FS10 at a workstation to a full scan tunnel, with a licence upgrade path into machine vision inspection.
RFID systems
Count what nobody can see.
Zebra fixed and ultra-rugged RFID readers, overhead RTLS, transition readers and forklift-mounted units, plus the RFID printers and encoded tags to feed them, manufactured and supplied by us.
Voice-directed work
Hands on product, eyes up, instructions in the ear.
Honeywell Voice Guided Work Solutions software on Vocollect A700-series devices and headsets, integrated to your WMS or ERP. Picking, putaway, replenishment, receiving, inspection and cycle counting.
The part nobody else can quote on
Any distributor can send you a machine. What decides whether an automation project succeeds is what happens in the 18 months after it arrives.
We have been doing automatic identification in Canada for 50 years. We manufacture the labels that run through these machines, which means the consumable is engineered to the applicator instead of sourced against it. Our technicians are factory trained on the equipment we sell, and they are here, not across a border with a customs broker between you and a spare part.
50 years in barcoding
Half a century identifying and tracking product in Canadian operations.
Factory trained, in Canada
Technicians trained on the equipment we sell, with response tiers from self-service through to mission critical.
We make the label too
Labels and ribbons specified to the machine and the surface, not sourced against them.
We own the WMS
Automation events land in ProVision WMS, software we build and support ourselves.
Six steps, and you know the cost after step two
No surprise pricing halfway through. The scope and the fixed price land before anything gets built.
Line assessment
We walk the line, measure speeds, photograph product and surfaces, and review your label specs and host systems.
Application proposal
Equipment recommendation, layout drawing, integration scope and a fixed price.
Sample testing
Where the application calls for it, we run your product and your label on the proposed configuration before you commit.
Build and factory test
Configuration, integration and pre-shipment testing, so the system arrives working rather than arriving to be worked on.
Install and train
On-site commissioning, operator and maintenance training, and the documentation your team keeps after we leave.
Service and supply
Preventive maintenance, spare parts, and labels and ribbons matched to the machine that runs them.
Start with the line, not the catalogue
Tell us the product, the speed and the label, and we will tell you what fits, including when the answer is that you do not need automation yet.
Tell us what runs on the line
Product, speed, label size and the surface it goes on. Photos of the line help more than a spec sheet.
We walk the line with you
An application specialist measures speeds and confirms what the application actually needs.
You get a fixed price
Equipment, layout drawing and integration scope, priced before anything gets built.
Book a line assessment
No obligation and no scripted demo. Canadian operations only.