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Almost 100 years after helping create the package delivery business, United Parcel Service of America has committed hundreds of millions of dollars to an overhaul designed to improve the process.

The company is more than halfway through a $600 million plan to build a suite of software and hardware products that it hopes will save it a similar amount annually when fully in place by 2007. Included in that cost is not just the purchase and development of new technology, but the price of buying new equipment and building extra conveyer belts at each of UPS' more than 1,000 sorting facilities nationwide.

Mark Hopkins, a UPS vice president and head of the team implementing the overhaul, says the goal of the new system is to shave minutes off the time it takes to deliver each package. Spread across the entire organization UPS believes the system, called "package flow technology," will save it 100 million miles annually, a reduction of about 14 million gallons of fuel and 130,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year.
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Read More / Source: News.com