What Matters

For more than a century, industrial engineers have relied on stopwatches, observations, and manual time studies to improve productivity.

These methods helped build some of the world’s most efficient factories.

But modern operations have become significantly more complex.

Today’s manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, and service environments require a more objective, scalable, and data-driven approach.

Why It Matters

Traditional time studies often depend on human observations, sampling techniques, manual note taking, and short observation windows.

While valuable, these approaches face several limitations: observer bias, limited sample size, inconsistent measurements, and difficulty capturing large-scale movement patterns.

Many organisations still ask: How far are our operators walking? Where are congestion points occurring? Which routes are creating waste?

Traditional studies can estimate these answers. Modern technology can measure them.

  • Human observations
  • Sampling techniques
  • Manual note taking
  • Short observation windows
  • Observer bias and limited sample size
  • Difficulty capturing large-scale movement patterns

Enter UWB Mini 5

Ultra-Wideband (UWB) technology provides centimetre-level positioning accuracy inside buildings.

The UWB Mini 5 platform offers an affordable entry point into real-time location tracking.

A typical setup includes UWB anchors, UWB tags attached to people, carts, or assets, and real-time positioning software.

This allows organisations to automatically capture travel distance, walking routes, time-in-zone, congestion hotspots, asset movements, and workflow heatmaps.

Instead of manually drawing spaghetti diagrams, organisations can generate them automatically.

  • UWB anchors or base stations
  • UWB tags attached to people, carts, or assets
  • Real-time positioning software
  • Travel distance and walking routes
  • Time-in-zone and congestion hotspots
  • Asset movements and workflow heatmaps

What This Unlocks

Using UWB Mini 5, organisations can begin answering practical operational questions with data instead of guesswork.

They can understand how much time is spent walking versus value-added work, which workstations create unnecessary travel, where operators spend the most time, and which layouts generate the highest movement waste.

These insights support more informed operational decisions.

  • How much time is spent walking versus value-added work?
  • Which workstations create unnecessary travel?
  • Where do operators spend the most time?
  • Which layouts generate the highest movement waste?

The Bottom Line

Traditional time studies remain useful.

However, organisations seeking future-ready operations need more than observation.

UWB Mini 5 provides a practical starting point for data-driven movement intelligence, enabling organisations to understand how work moves through their facilities with greater objectivity and scale.