Itronix Inks Deal With Fedex Express Transportation Services Company Will Use Local Company’S Tracking Computers

Wed., Dec. 13, 2000

By Tom Sowa toms@spokesman.com (509) 459-5492

FedEx Express has ordered 780 handheld wireless package-tracking computers from Spokane’s Itronix Corp., the companies said this week.

FedEx Express is the $15-billion-per-year subsidiary of Fed Ex Corp. which provides express transportation services, primarily across the country or overseas.

After developing a new series of information scanning devices, FedEx managers wanted to improve the company’s delivery tracking system.

They chose Itronix’s fex21 handheld devices, produced at the company’s Husky factory in England.

The fex21 weighs two pounds and measures 7.5 inches wide, 6 inches high and 1.5 inches deep. It’s designed to operate in temperatures ranging from 10 to 122 degrees.

List price for each unit is $1,499. How much FedEx paid for the 780 units wasn’t disclosed. Most of these units will be used by FedEx workers in Europe and the Middle East. Delivery will continue over 18 months, said an Itronix spokesman.

Itronix manufactures a number of rugged wireless computers for utilities, service crews, mobile workers and emergency care agencies, such as police forces.

Its Spokane manufacturing site produces a line of laptop units, while the English site makes handheld devices like the fex21.

FedEx has been using other Itronix products, including hundreds of handheld computers ordered several years ago.

That order followed a visit by FedEx Chairman Frederick Smith in the early 1990s to the Spokane Itronix plant. Without much fanfare, Smith flew to Spokane, toured the Itronix offices and closed the order.

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Itronix Inks Deal With Fedex Express Transportation Services Company Will Use Local Company’S Tracking Computers

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