Evaluating Postal Systems’ Current State, Roadmap to Automation

This article explores the key aspects and challenges in transforming the postal and package delivery networks to a fully automated and self-learning stage. It analyzes its current state, possible gaps in research and business solutions, identifying the existing technologies, and the possible management challenges. The authors also consider socio-economic factors during the current context analysis stage. The authors reviewed the literature and identified best practices and technological solutions used in the postal delivery field and existing research gaps. The most commonly pointed technological solutions include for example IoT for package tracking and machine learning with big data for workload optimization. A case study with company stakeholders in the form of interview was followed, to identify the best practices used and technological issues in the field. The researchers analyzed the current state and introduced the potential advancements of the target state - a more efficient, technology-driven postal delivery system.