Zenbi is Z3’s Data Automation Hub, simplifying the receipt and processing of waste and recycling data.
You or your haulers simply provide Zenbi with electronic copies of invoices, remittances, bill of ladings, or other documentation supporting the transfer of materials. Zenbi ingests the data into the Z3 system, allowing you to generate reports, measure environmental impacts, and realize cost savings.
It’s that simple!
How Zenbi works
After completing the Z3 onboarding process, you will have multiple options to provide data to Zenbi:
- You can log in to the Z3 System and drop a file for Zenbi to process (as shown above)
- You can forward documents or spreadsheets via email to [email protected].
- Either you (or Z3 with your cooperation) can coordinate with the Material Hauler to have the hauler email monthly invoices or remittances directly to [email protected].
Upon receipt of a file, Zenbi processes and structures the document using the resources of Google’s Document AI technology and customized processors trained by Z3’s expert team.
After Zenbi has worked its magic, a Z3 associate is notified that files are ready for final processing. A Z3 team member, using a specially developed human-in-the-loop interface, validates the accuracy of the ingested data and approves the activity for final processing into the Z3 system. The entire process may be completed in minutes, but you can be assured full processing will be complete within one business day. While Zenbi doesn’t sleep or eat, the human’s that validate Zenbi’s work do…. so there may be a slight delay.
How Zenbi helps you
You face many challenges when collecting waste & recycling data for analysis. Haulers report data in a variety of formats, data provided is often incomplete, and before data can be entered you or your administrative staff often must find time to gather the files, perform calculations, and enter the data into a sustainability system. This is a time consuming process and prone to errors.
By automating the process with Zenbi, Z3 ensures that data is processed timely and accurately using standard methodologies. Perhaps most importantly, Zenbi saves everyone time and money by automating redundant calculations and manual data entry processes.
What makes Zenbi special
Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technologies have been used to process invoices and other structured documents since the late 1990’s. The technology is proven and reliably extracts standard data like invoice numbers, invoice amounts, and dates.
However, OCR technology continues to face challenges interpreting the context of data in the “messy middle” of an invoice or remittance document. Waste & Recycling data presents a special challenge due to lack of consistent terminology, structure, and missing data.
Z3 has developed Zenbi to address the challenge of interpreting the data in the “messy middle”. Without giving away all of our secrets, we have decades of experience processing this type of data and have developed a structure to reliably ingest the data with minimal human intervention. We partnered with Google, trained their custom processors to understand our methodology, and built a custom interface on top of Google’s proven technology.
We are excited to share Zenbi with you and are confident Zenbi will help save you time and money, while supporting your sustainability efforts.
Are you ready to use Zenbi or learn more?
Click the link below to schedule a time to talk.