More exciting enhancements are now here, with even more coming!
First, let’s take a look at what’s new with Spectre (for Hectre Orchard Management App enhancements and last month’s releases, please scroll further down).
Hectre’s Computer Vision AI – Spectre
Innovation Highlights:
Spectre Top Down Color Automation
Released October – Contact your Customer Success rep to update your Spectre Top Down App!
Spectre Top Down customers have been loving how easy and accurate our color automation enhancement has been, which was launched last month.
What does color automation mean? Color parameters will be detected by Hectre’s Spectre AI technology and will be automatically selected, depending on what the current lighting conditions are, making capturing color data easier and more accurate than ever before.
- Spectre for Color customers will be able to categorize fruit varieties into color families so that similar varieties can share the same configuration, cutting down setup time and improving consistency between similar varieties.
- Spectre will automatically detect what the lighting condition is and apply this for color assessment, saving time and reducing manual error.
- If a brand new lighting condition is detected for one of your varieties, an email will be automatically sent, prompting you to set up that missing parameter. You can then just hop into the Spectre dashboard and within a few minutes of receiving the email, you can add the new parameter. As soon as the new parameter is created, Spectre will go back and add color information to all groups with that missing parameter. Easy!
- Color Automation eliminates the time and guesswork of choosing color parameters alongside the risk of human error by fully automating the selection of color parameters.
If you’re using Spectre Top Down, but have yet to take advantage of color automation, contact your Customer Success rep today, or send us an email here and we’ll get you set up.
Not using Spectre Top Down but want to gain massive fruit size and color data straight off the truck? Contact us for a free consultation.
Spectre Hand-Held Color Automation
Expected Release Date: Mid-Late November
The same color automation benefits that Hectre’s Spectre Top Down customers are enjoying, will soon be available for Spectre Hand-Held color customers as well.
Keep a lookout for the launch email!
Here’s a video from Hectre’s Group Product Manager, Aaron with more detail on these automation enhancements
Spectre Color For Cherries
Expected Release Date: Mid November
Spectre for Cherries customers, if you have the Spectre Cherry Color add-on, very soon you’ll know how many cherries of each shade of red are in your bins and totes using the same image you take to currently size them.
If you’ve been using Spectre to size your cherries in past seasons, please reach out to your Customer Success rep to enquire about getting access to valuable color data next season.
With Spectre Color for Cherries, you can now differentiate between different shades of red, enabling estimations of what % of cherries belong to each color band. This data can be used to give objective feedback about picker performance – are they picking to the right color – and to forecast how many dark/premium cherries you will have for the pack and sales, compared to lower color cherries.
Spectre Color Grade
More big things are on their way for Spectre customers with Spectre Color Grade next in the pipeline. With this enhancement, you’ll be able to combine color information into grades, helping to make your color information more usable and relevant to your packing and growing operations.
We will be building on the foundational work from Color Automation and Color for Cherries to bring more flexibility in how you set up your color parameters. You will be able to use multiple shades of red for your premium grades, as well as other colors like green and yellow for your Granny Smith / Golden Delicious varieties.
Spectre Color Grade is currently in the design. Please reach out to aaron@hectre.com if you would like details, or to provide industry feedback as we build out this great new feature.
Fully Automated Solution – Automated Spectre Top Down
Released October – In your hands now!
Want to fully automate your Spectre Top Down setup?
The combination of Hectre’s new Color Automation tool, with our exciting Spectre Top Down Automation solution, means you can now gain fruit size and color data straight off the truck, without typing or clicking on anything in the desktop app.
Spectre Top Down can be triggered using your existing processes – for example scanning a barcode, or pressing a button in your ERP. If you build a light integration with our Spectre Top Down Automation API, the details will be automatically loaded into Hectre’s Spectre Top Down, and your Spectre recordings will automatically start and stop. No need to press a single key or click the mouse once inside Spectre Top Down.
Contact us here, or contact your Hectre Customer Success rep to see if Automated Spectre Top Down is right for you.
Hectre’s Orchard Management Software
Innovation Highlights:
Professional Services To Optimize Your Orchard Operation
Growers, supervisors, office admins and payroll magicians, don’t always have the time, the team resource, or the specific experience required, to identify and put in place the special reports, data exports and customized information, that can help make their processes more efficient, enable them to access deeper insights, and support management and improvement decisions.
Hectre’s specialists can provide this expertise, just like an extension to your team, but without the ongoing cost. Pay for what you need, when you need it. Here are some examples of recent work our Professional Services team have helped customers with:
- Generating custom data reports that deliver specific data points for decision making
- Creating customized payroll exports to streamline the payroll process
- Support with mass information editing for improved accuracy and time savings
- Connecting Hectre’s real-time payroll, timesheet and harvest data straight into existing business intelligence tools to support more custom analysis and decision-making
- And other specialized customization (we have the data experts and can identify what data can help you to solve a problem you’re working on)
If you’d like to discuss a problem or improvement you’re working on, get in touch!
Timesheet Editing – Straight Off The Dashboard!
We understand the challenges that come with running payroll. In fact, at Hectre, to support our customers, we have an entire team dedicated to this critical workstream.
To make payroll even easier for Hectre customers, we’re developing a new feature that will enable Managers/Admins to edit timesheets directly in the Hectre dashboard, eliminating the need for back-and-forth with supervisors and corrections in the Hectre mobile app. This enhancement will support Hectre customers to streamline their payroll processes even further, saving you time and hassle.
More info coming soon.
NZAPI RPIN Feature
Released October – In your hands now!
Since last month’s launch, many New Zealand apple and pear growers have mapped their Hectre orchard structure with the NZAPI structure (RPIN, Production Site, Management Area, Variety) using our self-service mapping tool. These growers can now simply integrate their Hectre bin tickets with packhouse software, paving the way for seamless data transfer, streamlined operations and enhanced traceability.
This new Hectre mapping tool will also play a pivotal role in the upcoming release of the new Hectre Spray Module. As CropSure relies on the NZAPI orchard structure for their verification and certification processes, your Hectre orchard structure will be matched, meaning you’ll be all set up for spray certification requirements as well.
Click here to learn how to use this simple mapping tool, or contact us for any assistance.
Other Recent Releases
Spectre for Android has officially been released, providing the same accurate size and color data at scale that you’ve been used to on iPhones and iPads.
We’ve already been seeing some fantastic feedback coming from growers and packers now using Spectre on their Android devices. If your a current Spectre customer and have an Android device you’d like to scan with:
- Simply go to the Google Play Store
- Download the Hectre App and login with your existing account
- Start scanning with Spectre
If you need a hand getting Spectre for Android setup, contact us here.
Hectre QC API
- You’re now able to directly connect the Hectre API to the current analytics tools that you use day-to-day.
- This enables all the QC information you’ve collected through the Hectre app to be easily accessed and displayed for more detailed analysis.
▶ If you would like to access the Hectre QC API, click here to view instructions.
Hectre Staff API Integration
- The Hectre Staff API enables you to synchronize all changes relating to pickers – wage rate, employment status, personal details – from your external payroll system straight into Hectre.
- If you’re looking to reduce double-entry and ensure your pickers’ details are kept up to date, contact us about using the Hectre Staff API.
