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Tag: IT

WMS is not just for Christmas

Posted on by David Priestman

This is the time of year when the majority of online retailers are going through their peak sales period in the run up to Christmas. During the pandemic and lockdown period almost every business with an ecommerce dimension saw sales peaks that were higher than anything they have ever encountered. And despite the fact the pandemic is probably behind us, growth in online sales have continued to soar. In any event, with events such as Halloween and Black Friday having driven sales this year, it is not hard to foresee that demand for online items will continue in the run-up to the festive season.

To cope with this, advanced preparation and planning done beforehand will pay off. The systems and procedures you have put in place to handle significantly increased seasonal volumes should mean that even with temporary hired-in resource, things will still go relatively smoothly. Or will they?

Even before they experienced business during the pandemic, most online resellers could cite at least one experience of underestimating the impact of the festive season. And in order not to repeat that, a common practice is to hire in agency staff at a premium to help with the increased workload. On Christmas Eve, all being well, they can sit back and breathe a sigh of relief, knowing they have just about coped, once again.

Extra sales at Christmas

And it is easy to see why, with the extra sales and profits potentially generated at Christmas, the short-term cost of the labour involved is easily justified. However, cost aside, using temporary labour at any time can bring problems. With greater awareness of the consequences of illness to others, staff are likely to take time off if they suffer from this year’s flu or another bout of Covid. That will inevitably put pressure on your existing operations but recruiting temporary replacements or adding short-term capacity over the peak season may not be easy.

Even if it is possible to recruit effectively, the main problem with temporary employees is user unfamiliarity. With even the best designed and implemented systems there is a minimum level of training needed for temporary staff to be able to function, even at a basic level. New staff will be well short of the experience and knowledge of regular staff, no matter how well you train them. They will not know the environment, the product, or the processes. So inevitably they will be less productive, absorb more supervisor time, and generate more errors which require correction and incur time and cost. They may also cost you a few lost sales, and some unwanted customer issues.

Minimise labour

So, is there a solution to this? Is it possible to minimise the requirement for additional labour in the Christmas period and still meet order fulfilment targets? Well yes, there is, and it seems odd that many companies would rather have a heavy financial outlay on extra staff at Christmas than deploy an IT system that could lessen or potentially even eradicate the need for those staff.

The die is cast for this year, no doubt, but that does not mean things cannot be improved for the future. While some extra cost is always likely there are many ways that deploying the right IT system, particularly a warehouse management system (WMS), can help. This would not only reduce your seasonal expense, but also minimise your costs and boost productivity all year round.

To paraphrase a well-known expression: “A WMS is not just for Christmas.” Not only will it help you manage workloads and reduce excess labour costs at Christmas, it will bring joy all year round! A WMS is designed to manage your physical stock with optimum efficiency by using simple, efficient, and secure processes for all activities from receipt through to despatch. As these are largely system driven which will reduce reliance on staff knowledge, a particular benefit when using temporary labour.

A WMS will ensure that all the information you need about received goods is correctly recorded. It will then automatically instruct putaway to a system generated location, removing the need for staff to know where product is normally stored. When you receive an order, it will direct your pickers to the correct location to find the stock, taking into account any date or FIFO (first-in-first-out) rotation. It will then manage your pack and despatch process, ensuring you deliver the right product and quantity.

Accuracy, efficiency, productivity, and discipline

The benefits of using a WMS – accuracy, efficiency, productivity, and discipline – are magnified when you use the system in real-time with a dedicated app for handheld devices. This allows everything you do to be recorded in real-time, making your stock data accurate to the minute. It also means you can build in as much barcode verification as you need, trapping errors immediately and ensuring the complete accuracy of everything you receive, pick and despatch.

Having a WMS gives you a solid foundation of operational ‘best practice’ which can deliver even greater benefits at your seasonal peak. When you need extra staff, equipping them with an inexpensive handheld device reduces their training needs, so they can be effective almost immediately. As their work is system-directed and verified by real-time scanning, errors and supervisor intervention are cut to a minimum, allowing permanent staff to focus on their own roles.

To save the punchline to the end, the best part of this is the cost. A WMS like ProSKU WMS Cloud – which is available as software-as-a-service (SaaS) and paid for monthly – needs little cost justification for the normal benefits it can provide. It will make your operation lean, efficient and competitive all year long. That will be a benefit to you every year when sales peaks are likely to be significantly higher than normal. When you consider the high (and recurring) cost of temporary seasonal labour, and how using a WMS could lessen this, the investment becomes positively insignificant.

10 most important SCM trends of 2023

Posted on by David Priestman

The war in Ukraine, the energy crisis and high inflation in many countries are presenting supply chain managers with major challenges. Additionally, the always present issues of shortage of skilled labour, supply chain disruptions and cost pressure also prove difficult. Ralf Duester, member of the board of the SCM software specialist Setlog, shows which trends will shape the year 2023.

His statements are based not only on numerous conversations with economic experts and scientists, but also on data from Setlog customers who use the SCM tool OSCA. In the fashion and fast-moving consumer goods sectors alone, these are more than 100 brands, including, for example, Marc O’Polo, Jack Wolfskin, KiK and Wenko.

1. Demand fluctuations force action

In many industrialised countries, companies are bracing themselves for a decline in demand. After years of continuous growth, briefly interrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic, experts are forecasting a recession. Industry leaders are tightening their focus on their customers – both in the B2C and B2B sector. Because of the high volatility, many companies are putting existing contracts to the test. Flexibility plays a key role in the realignment of contracts. To be able to plan better, close collaboration and trustworthy cooperation between all partners along the supply chain are necessary, which often requires new communication platforms.

Modern IT tools can be used to exchange information, join forces, and make quick decisions in the face of dynamic fluctuations in demand. The prerequisite for new communication channels is the willingness of all players to be transparent. Companies that use software and suitable algorithms to manage demand and supply globally will be one step ahead of their competition. The best strategy is for companies to devise agile approaches to permanently optimise the use of resources and production capacities. Modern demand planning software and business intelligence tools are increasingly important, depending on the industry and product.

2. Collaboration will be implemented

Collaboration is key for industry leaders – both in their businesses as well as their everyday life. This collaboration is playing a big role between internal teams as well as in cross-company supply chains. Everyone has access to data – based on specific authorisations – and exchanges this data on an ongoing basis – usually in real time. This approach improves supply chain efficiency and responsiveness. Data silos hinder successful business. Those who continue to use emails and spreadsheets for communication will find it very difficult to get an overall picture of the current status of an order.

3. Recruiting strategies change

One of the key challenges in the industrialised countries remains the shortage of skilled labour. Demographic changes in countries such as Germany and the US are also aggravating the problem. Leading companies offer attractive conditions to existing and potential staff. Many companies can become even more efficient – for example, by optimising the deployment of drivers with the help of trailer concepts or more decoupled loading times. In the long term, there is no getting around an employment-oriented workforce strategy. The best of the best also differentiate their recruiting approaches – for example, by generation or potential groups such as career changers or

foreign workers. They also offer differentiated retention programs and long-term prospects through flexible working hours, parental leave, and training and development programs. The latter is particularly important for well-established employees in supply chain management, as their tasks become more complex. Cooperation with universities is a good way to attract young talent to the company. In addition, new job requirements are developing in supply chain and logistics, as well as in environmental, social and governance (ESG) areas. Emerging job descriptions such as Data-Driven Planner, Traceability Analyst, Supply Chain Communicator, and Supply Network Innovator address changing requirements that companies must address. The prerequisite for all activities is a contemporary leadership culture that intends to change the understanding of leadership and allows transparent communication – including the involvement of employees’ opinions.

4. Cost awareness increases

Whether it’s new HR strategies or employee retention programs: All these measures cost money. In addition, companies are burdened by increased energy costs, rising interest rates and high inflation. At the same time, consumer spending is falling. Leading companies have already created cost awareness among employees. To achieve this, it is necessary to involve the workforce in the development of sales and costs with open and transparent communication and to develop an awareness of this. With the help of idea exchanges, employees can also be integrated into the process of finding solutions. Another important step is to increase flexibility. The biggest cost drivers must be identified, and action scenarios developed. Remote working, for example, makes it possible to reduce office space and lowers rental costs.

5. Investments in automation projects continue

Even though increased costs put a strain on company cash, many companies are pushing ahead with automation and digitisation projects already underway or initiating new ones. Only those who can keep up with high-performance logistics and the highest service levels lead the market. Planning and allocating budgets for automation, robotics, digitisation, energy savings and staff is money well spent. In intralogistics, for example, manual processes must be automated and digitised to achieve this. Robotics and machine learning also play a major role in order to be fast on one hand and keep error rates to a minimum on the other. IT experts look at digitisation along the entire supply chain and initiate new projects in several chain links at the same time. The use of open-source strategies will play an important role in the future – as will topics such as the digital delivery bill and the digital waybill.

6. Sustainability laws force action

Decarbonisation, social compliance and sustainability are becoming increasingly important for the economy. Following the UN Climate Change Conference in Sharm el-Sheik, consumers, politicians, and business partners are calling on companies to act quickly. The EU is pushing the pace with plans for a supply chain law, as is the United States with the recently enacted Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) or planned legislation in individual states such as New York (New

York Fashion Act). Company representatives are increasingly considering how to implement strategies from the circular economy so that fewer products are destroyed. Businesses that cannot track the path of their products from design to sourcing as well as production to shipping will have a hard time meeting the new requirements of governments, consumer groups and customers. Small companies are (still) excluded from supply chain laws, but often they can only do business with corporations if they comply with all the new regulations. They are required to be able to track and report on the climate and social impacts of their operations.

7. Purchasing and procurement are revamped

The new geopolitical situation shows that, depending on the industry, companies must take individual approaches to purchasing in order to become more resilient. The credo here is: resilience before price. Analyses of car manufacturers, for example, may show that re- or nearshoring of certain products or components makes sense. This may be more expensive, but it makes supply chains more stable. In the consumer goods market, due to enormous cost differences between Europe and the US in comparison to Asia, it makes more sense to keep production as much as possible in the Far East and previous sourcing countries, without looking for nearby factories or even building new ones. The shortage of skilled labour, rising interest rates, high inflation and freight costs that are levelling off at pre-Covid levels are arguments that speak against building or further expanding near- or reshoring in many industries.

Furthermore, when it comes to a company’s bottom line, purchasing, procurement and supply chain management are becoming increasingly important. The reason for this is that opportunities to push through higher prices in the lower and middle goods segment have become rare. Prices are becoming more and more transparent for customers through purchasing platforms. Profits are now generated through procurement – or more precisely – through process optimisation. In addition, companies’ inventory levels are being adjusted due to increased network disruptions – such as war, environmental disasters or strikes. The disruption in global transportation has shown it: For certain industries that depend on a few suppliers, it may be necessary to build up higher safety stocks, avoid single sourcing and generally rethink order processes.

8. Supply networks replace supply chains

The cooperation of companies with purchasing offices, suppliers, factories, test laboratories, technicians, logistics service providers, and dealers is becoming increasingly important. That’s why companies will be looking to further strengthen their business networks in the coming year. Since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, they have found that their company-centric systems are not working ideally. As a result, leaders across industries are already using tools and platforms that enable secure data sharing, as well as support tight collaborative workflows around forecasting, ordering, production, capacity, delivery, and inventory in real time. As this collaboration, ideal use of data and optimised information flow eliminates errors, delays and inefficiencies, all stakeholders can reduce costs and improve their competitiveness using enterprise networks.

9. ERP silos are being torn down

It’s no secret: small companies rely on one or two in-house systems, some corporations on 20 or more. Even before the pandemic, the inefficiencies of these self-constructed silos were surfacing. Covid-19 only acted as an amplifier. The coexistence of systems artificially added to inventory buffers, caused information delays, and involved either manual labour or high IT costs for interfaces, maintenance, and upgrades. More and more companies are shedding these silos because they can no longer afford the cost, effort, and hassle involved. The best solution is to move supply chain workflows to a collaborative network platform that cuts across all silos and enables both data sharing and true data transfer across production, departments, and companies. Best-of-breed solutions connected via REST API with intelligent IT architecture break down silos and enable collaborative, cross-company working with optimal data sharing.

10. Supply chain managers are using modern technologies

Companies more often realise that thousands of decisions with dozens of parameters have to be made every day. The gut feeling of experienced managers is no longer sufficient. Modern companies rely on new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence to make decisions. Trailblazing companies will automate processes even more and take advantage of AI in prescriptive analytics and autonomous agents to achieve efficiency gains. Open source is increasingly used in supply chain management, especially for standard interfaces. Managers are adopting supply chain software technologies to increase businesses’ resilience and competitiveness. As a result, new automation technologies are changing roles and tasks within the organisation. With new technologies, companies can accelerate planning to delivery, reduce buffers, control processes efficiently and counteract the shortage of skilled workers.

Tech firms team up over route optimisation

Posted on by David Priestman

UK business technology solutions integrator The Barcode Warehouse and The Algorithm People have partnered up to deliver their Transport and Logistics customers added value services and solutions, with an integrated approach to implementing route optimisation, efficiency, and decarbonisation strategies.

After identifying clear complementary services, the two businesses have joined forces to expand the market for The Algorithm People’s flagship ‘My Transport Planner’ software and providing a go-to hardware and Managed Services partner to its customers via The Barcode Warehouse.

The Barcode Warehouse, which has recently opened a multi-million-pound Innovation & Customer Experience Centre in the Midlands, had been searching the market for an industry-relevant decarbonisation solution to showcase within its new centre; and My Transport Planner stood out.

Kevan Mutton, MD at The Barcode Warehouse, commented: “It is important to us that our Innovation and customer experience centre has a focus on sustainability and decarbonisation. So, when we started working with The Algorithm People, the synergy was immediately obvious.  We are pleased to be able to formally announce this partnership and now, proactively, and hands-on be able to support our customers on their decarbonisation journeys; helping them become more efficient and reduce fuel costs, especially at a time when the rising costs are hurting so many businesses.”

Route optimisation for peak efficiency

My Transport Planner is a route optimisation platform, that enables fleets to operate at peak efficiency, while also – reducing costs and carbon emissions. The Algorithm People’s My Transport Planner is built on a powerful suite of optimisation algorithms that are able to identify opportunities for introducing zero-emissions vehicles across an operation to assist transport and logistics organisations in planning and managing their roadmap to decarbonisation.

Colin Ferguson, CEO at The Algorithm People, added: “The Barcode Warehouse is an integral supplier to the transport and logistics sector, and we are delighted to have secured this partnership with the company. Our optimisation algorithms are able to release significant productivity improvements for customers and we are excited to integrate this with The Barcode Warehouse’ class-leading solutions.”

The Barcode Warehouse, which has been operating for 35 years, says it focuses on bringing together the best-in-class hardware, software, and services; to create tailormade solutions to address real business challenges. Both organisations stress the importance of ensuring hardware, software and services are considered when looking to technology to reduce fuel costs, improve efficiency and to decarbonise.

Tecsys partners with SVT Robotics

Posted on by David Priestman

Tecsys Inc., an industry-leading supply chain management software company, and SVT Robotics Inc., a leader in enterprise software for the rapid deployment of industrial robotics, have partnered to develop and launch an out-of-the-box integrated connection between the Tecsys’ Elite supply chain platform and SVT’s SOFTBOT Platform.

The integration will provide Tecsys Elite customers faster deployment and lower complexity without the need for lengthy custom code development often involved in multi-system automation and robotics deployments.

SVT Robotics is an enterprise software company that is revolutionising robot deployments in the warehousing and manufacturing industries. With certified connectors to many of the industry’s foremost automation providers, and partnerships with companies such as 6 River Systems, Fetch Robotics (Zebra Technologies), Locus Robotics, MiR, OMRON, OTTO Motors and many more, SVT’s SOFTBOT Platform enables companies to deploy the robots, automation, and IoT devices they need in just days or weeks.

“Automation is becoming more important to power supply chains of the future, so it’s critical those technologies are connected to a solid WMS with core warehouse management functionality,” says A.K. Schultz, founder and CEO of SVT Robotics. “The pre-built integration that Tecsys and SVT are developing connects to top-tier automation from leading providers, enabling Tecsys customers to customise and then rapidly deploy the specific automation they need today.”

Tecsys contends that bringing automation into a warehouse should begin with a needs assessment and design plan, which then informs hardware selection that will meet those needs. Whereas some software vendors operate as automation resellers for a limited set of systems, Tecsys’ partnership with SVT empowers supply chain organisations to assess, design and integrate across a wide spectrum of automation choices. The result is a warehouse operation powered by end-to-end WMS functionality and easily automated workflows using today’s most innovative technologies.

Peter Brereton, president and CEO of Tecsys, comments: “A company’s automation strategy and equipment should be tailored to their specific use case, never throttled by the software, and that is exactly what this SVT partnership makes possible through rapid integration. We want to give Tecsys customers native plug-and-play robotics integration capabilities today and into the future as this warehouse automation market evolves so that they will be ready to deploy the technologies they need to remain competitive. SVT’s SOFTBOT Platform will enable flexibility and freedom in a quickly developing industry.”

JLT unveils innovative software dashboard

Posted on by David Priestman

JLT Mobile Computers, a leading developer of reliable computing solutions for demanding environments, has launched JLT Insights, a new data-driven software dashboard for industries with warehouses.

The customisable software solution enables warehouse and IT managers to monitor their vehicle-mount terminals (VMT) and to gain greater operational insights. Based on various data-points collected from within the IT device and its sensors, JLT Insights empowers customers to optimise the daily operations of their harsh work environments as well as their host vehicles.

These new capabilities are made possible thanks to information delivered by sensors embedded in the JLT6012 Series VMTs. As well as informing users of the health of their IT assets, accelerometers and other sensors within the VMTs can deliver information relating to forklift movement, speed, acceleration, impact, location, and time.

Access to this digital data opens huge possibilities for warehouse and IT managers to streamline and enhance their picking and logistic operations. By identifying bottlenecks, network connectivity issues, high-traffic areas, driving dynamics, accident-prone zones, and various IT health signals, uptime can be optimised, flow can be improved, and general operations enhanced with regards to both efficiency and safety.

JLT technology similar to cellphone

Impacts are a fact of life in forklift operations. But when you combine impacts with location data, you can ascertain higher safety risk areas and/or physical bottlenecks within logistic operations. Combine impacts with time and JLT Insights users can identify shift patterns, while time and location will highlight overly long local dwell times or indicate heavy traffic areas.

According to Andreas Nivard, General Manager at JLT Software Solutions: “The JLT6012 Series VMTs from JLT Mobile Computers incorporate sensor technology similar to what you would find in a cellphone. By leveraging the data generated by these sensors, we are now delivering even more value-add features through software solutions.

“The real power behind JLT’s new hard- and software combined approach,” he continues, “comes from using JLT Insights to combine and contextualise the data captured via the sensors. This data can then be compared before displaying the results in an easy-to-use and -understand digital dashboard, full of useful information for warehouse and IT managers.”

The software is configurable to the customer’s application. JLT engineers will help users to define which data is most useful to capture and formulate the queries which indicate the most relevant actionable information. The identified data points can be configured by JLT, local partners, or customers themselves to add the biggest operational value for continued improvement.

Predicting issues

There are multiple possibilities for operational improvement, but the primary driver behind the dashboard’s development is to increase uptime, by highlighting and predicting issues before they occur. This gives companies the ability to develop and deliver remedies before these issues turn into far more costly downtime.

“The ability to spot problems before they result in downtime is a huge plus for us,” explains Fredrik Edvardsen, IT Manager at IV Produkt, a company based in Växjö, Sweden that develops and manufactures innovative solutions for air handling. “We now have proactive insights into many more operational features, including power supplies, disk space, forklift run times and service intervals.”

JLT Insights is available today for new and existing users of JLT6012 Windows 10 VMTs on a per month and device cost basis. “The dashboard comes in two tiers,” Edvardsen explains. “The first gives all the essential information from the IT and dynamics sensors, including event-based notifications, while the next tier up adds statistics and allows users to write queries that can compare and action one dataset versus another.”

For new JLT6012 VMT buyers, the software will be preinstalled on the units. Existing owners can contact JLT via the website for downloading the software.

In addition to the JLT6012 unit, JLT Insights can be used with other Windows 10 VMTs from JLT, albeit with limited functionality because previous generations do not include the built-in sensors. Support for the Android-based JLT6012A™ VMT is in development and will be released in the first half of next year. Many more features are on the roadmap, and JLT is accepting suggestions from its user base.

“We’ve worked closely with JLT in testing out the software and suggesting features as part of their pilot program,” says Martin Carlsson, Warehouse Manager at IV Produkt. “We feel like JLT has really listened to our needs and we now eagerly anticipate using JLT Insights over the next 6 months to make data-driven decisions to increase productivity in our warehouse.”

 

 

Exiger joins WEF Innovators Community

Posted on by David Priestman

Exiger, a global leading third-party and supply chain management software company, has joined the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Innovators Community. The invitation-only unicorn group is comprised of leading companies, valued at over US$1bn, that are at the forefront of ethical technological and business model innovation. Exiger will contribute to the platform on Shaping the Future of Mobility, seeking to tackle issues on resilient supply chains and environmental sustainability.

“The World Economic Forum is pleased to welcome Exiger to join our Global Innovators community,” says Verena Kuhn, Head of the Global Innovators Community, World Economic Forum. “Including new, innovative voices is essential in the work we do at the Forum; we look forward to what Exiger’s expertise will add to our projects, dialogues and platforms.”

The Shaping the Future of Mobility Platform is dedicated to creating new ways of thinking that accelerate the global transition to safer, cleaner and more inclusive transportation systems, optimize the delivery of goods, and ensure easy access to mobility for all. Exiger’s work with the World Economic Forum will focus on the crucial role of supply chains in achieving sustainable and inclusive mobility; how cutting-edge data analytics can enable more sustainable systems; and how today’s mobility systems can meet future demand.

Exiger proud to join

“We’re proud to join the Global Innovators Community and look forward to working with pioneering companies as we demonstrate how every business can do well by doing good in the world,” said Brandon Daniels, CEO of Exiger. “Exiger is committed to bringing radical transparency to global supply chains and furthering the unique impact that the World Economic Forum recognizes rapidly expanding unicorns can have on society. We’re excited to collaborate with this great community to introduce new ideas and fresh thinking that can help protect lives, livelihoods and industries around the globe.”

Exiger’s proprietary real-time supply chain management technology empowers companies and government agencies to rapidly surface, understand, and mitigate critical threats to their entire supplier ecosystem. The platform delivers unparalleled transparency to better manage global supply chains and mitigate risks such as ESG, reputational, financial, cyber, operational risks, and adversarial ownership, control or influence at unprecedented speed and scale.

Exiger has dramatically accelerated its growth in the past several years including its acquisition of Supply Dynamics, creating the first end-to-end supply chain visibility and holistic risk management solution. Matt Hibbard, CFO of Exiger said, “Exiger’s focus on making the world a safer place to prosper is the reason we have been able to accelerate our client growth each year and join the Global Innovators Community at this level. We’re proud that our customers continue to view Exiger as the most trusted partner to help them achieve new levels of supply chain transparency, inclusiveness and sustainability, and we’re excited to work with the WEF to amplify this work.”

The Global Innovators Community is part of the World Economic Forum – the international organization for public-private cooperation based in Geneva, Switzerland. Each year the World Economic Forum hosts its annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

 

SEKO and GreyOrange form strategic partnership

Posted on by David Priestman

SEKO Logistics, a leading global logistics provider, has formed a strategic partnership with GreyOrange, a global leader in automated robotic fulfilment and inventory optimisation software, to help scale-up its warehouse operations.

The partnership, which will involve SEKO using a fleet of GreyOrange’s Ranger Assist Bots and GreyMatter fulfilment orchestration platform, will enable the company to both increase available capacity and throughput across its warehouse while also reducing operating costs. GreyOrange’s solution will empower SEKO to scale its warehouse operations to meet changing demand without having to source additional labour.

“In our industry, building a scalable logistics solution to meet the ever-changing demand cycles, whilst controlling an increasing cost base, is critical in our customer offering,” said Paul Lockwood, Group Managing Director UK & I for SEKO. “This new partnership with GreyOrange allows our fulfilment centres, starting in the UK, to manage those fluctuations seamlessly and empower our clients to turn their supply chains into a competitive differentiator. GreyOrange’s AI-driven software and automation serves as a powerful tool to ensure we’re always delivering high-velocity ecommerce solutions for our clients no matter the season.”

GreyMatter from GreyOrange

GreyOrange’s GreyMatter fulfilment orchestration platform coordinates and assigns the work activities of warehouse robots such as Ranger Assist to maximise productivity, speed, accuracy and safety in distribution operations. GreyMatter matches robot agents according to work needs, including capacity and demand peaks, for seamless inventory orchestration.

“We are honoured to be partnering with SEKO, one of the premier retail and e-commerce logistic providers – to help provide a way for warehouses to operate more efficiently during peak times”, said Samay Kohli, Co-Founder and CEO of GreyOrange. “Together with our AI software and smart robots, we will be able to solve some of the most pressing issues facing logistics operations currently.”

GreyOrange will be working with Zebra Fetch Robotics, to provide the Ranger Assist bots. The Ranger Assist is an autonomous mobile robot (AMR) that supports a variety of e-commerce fulfilment and wholesale picking workflows, including each and batch picking, as well as interleaving replenishment and putaway. Industry-leading on-board robot safety software and sensors enable the AMR system to be ANSI/RIA R15.08 conforming and carry the CE mark.

“Robotics automation provides an outstanding range of scalable solutions for warehouse challenges in today’s on-demand economy,” said Marcel Kars, VP Robotics Automation, Zebra Technologies. “AMRs can deliver greater workflow efficiencies and improved worker productivity gains by streamlining e-commerce orders, automating the movement of goods and assisting workers with picking.”

 

 

Mandata makes senior appointment

Posted on by David Priestman

Mandata, a leading transport management software provider, has appointed Tim Pearcey as its Chief Sales Officer.

Pearcey joins Mandata with more than 25 years’ experience in automotive solutions. In 1996, he joined Kerridge – a leading UK supplier of Dealer Management Systems at the time – as a Regional Sales Executive for the North of England and Scotland. Having worked his way up through the business, Pearcey became responsible for managing enterprise accounts and brought on board several new major groups. He moved into a sales leadership position in 2008 and took on the role of Sales Director for CDK’s UK business six years ago. After the business was bought by Francisco Partners and rebranded to Keyloop, Pearcey picked up responsibility for the Irish sales team.

Commitment to Mandata growth

Mandata’s CEO, Chris Rigg, commented: “I am excited to welcome Tim to Mandata. His appointment emphasises Mandata’s commitment to the growth and continued success of the company. Tim brings with him a wealth of knowledge and experience, and I have complete confidence that he will successfully advance our growth and expansion strategy as he leads our sales team and the business to new heights.”

Pearcey added: “I am delighted to join the Mandata team. As a leader in the industry, Mandata is poised to become the gold standard by which all others are measured. I look forward to growing the business and welcoming more clients on board, helping them transform and increase efficiencies in their own businesses with world-class transport management systems.”

Pearcey will focus on growing the business by leading the sales strategy to increase Mandata’s customer base across the UK and Europe.

 

C4T appoints new CEO

Posted on by Keith McKinley

Customs4trade, one of Europe’s leading SaaS platforms for customs management solutions, has strengthened its management team with the appointment of Rupert Spiegelberg as its new CEO. Chief Revenue Officer Jo Buvens, ex-Salesforce and Chief Product and Technology Officer Oliver Conze, ex SAP join Spiegelberg to drive C4T management and its digital platform CAS in a new direction to accelerate growth in 2023.

Spiegelberg succeeds Pieter Haesaert, who founded C4T together with Ilse Vermeersch as a customs consultancy in 2004 before developing the CAS platform ten years later. Founders Haesaert and Vermeersch will no longer be involved in the day-to-day operational management and strategy of C4T, but remain invested in the company as shareholders together with 83North, Hi Inov, 42CAP and 10x Group. Werner Koninckx will represent the founders on the board. Werner is chairman of 3E and DeltaQ and has extensive experience in scaling SaaS businesses.

“We are extremely proud of all the C4T’ers and our partners who have been relentlessly contributing to the progress we made at C4T the last years,” Haesaert and Vermeersch said. “We thank our clients and partners for the trust they put in our hands to service them in the complex and time critical world of customs compliance. C4T is now with CAS in a fantastic position to take advantage of all the changes in the customs world that we will see in coming years.”

CEO is SaaS veteran

Spiegelberg is a 20-year veteran of SaaS (Software as a Service) scale-up businesses in the UK, mainland Europe and the US. Buvens joins him as CRO, formerly Salesforce’s Regional Vice President and Country Leader for Belgium and Luxembourg, and by Oliver Conze as Chief Product and Technology Officer. Conze has spent 15 years at SAP – most recently as the German technology giant’s Chief Product Officer for Marketing Cloud.

“C4T is leading the way in driving down costs, speeding up turnaround times for UK and European importers and exporters and simplifying the hugely complex world of online customs management,” said Spiegelberg. “In taking up the role to lead C4T’s ‘A-team’ of customs experts, I will support their tireless dedication to transform our company into a champion of the sector. We will help our customers go beyond compliance to make customs and trade a strategic component of their growth.”

C4T, whose CAS digital platform manages more than one hundred thousand customs declarations every month for major brands such as Honda, Mizuno, Agristo, and many others, and delivers to customers the benefits of the increased digitisation of the customs sector as national governments across Europe move to upgrade customs systems over the course of the next couple of years.

 

Optimising warehouse inventories with AI

Posted on by Keith McKinley

A smooth-running supply chain starts in an efficient warehouse. From inventory distribution to sorting, warehouses play a strategic role. That is why it is essential to avoid bottlenecks and ensure the warehouse is running efficiently.

Jean-Baptiste Clouard, CEO at Flowlity, an innovative AI-based supply chain planning and optimisation solution, shares how to effectively use AI to optimise warehouse processes, as well as highlighting the benefits of implementing these processes for businesses.

Forecasting

Every year, billions of pounds are lost as a result of shortages or overstocks at the manufacturing and distribution stage. Maintaining an optimal stock level is essential to avoiding shortages and costly overstocks, but finding this balance is a challenge.

AI-based self-learning solutions can set minimum and maximum boundaries that help to avoid overstocking and shortages. Instead of aiming for a ‘correct’ amount of stock at all times, the algorithms continuously recalculate these minimum and maximum levels based on consumption history and sales patterns to ensure recommended stock levels stay up to date. Real-time alerts can be set to flag potential overstocks or shortages in advance so that action can be taken to resolve this, before it becomes a larger issue.

Using a self-learning system also reduces the potential for human error in calculating these min/max levels and takes the manual work out of the process – removing the need for someone to crunch the numbers. This leads to efficient inventory planning that ensures a more accurate flow of items in and out of a warehouse.

Information visibility

AI can be used to process large amounts of information in a short time, leading to data being more easily condensed and accessible. This data can then be entered into a system that connects all parties in the supply chain, allowing the same information to be shared from end to end. The current supply chain is based on each party acting independently, but using software to centralise information means that all users have visibility on orders. This encourages a unified approach to inventory management.

By having visibility on processes and orders further down the supply chain, warehouses can become more reactive to disruption and can adjust their inventories based on real time information from how much stock is being used down the line. Storing data and information in a centralised system also eliminates the need to provide regular updates to the rest of the supply chain, leading to greater responsiveness to risk and enhanced contingency planning.

Warehouse planning

Having full visibility on orders coming in and out of a warehouse is crucial to ensuring efficiency and accuracy in fulfilling these orders. AI software can be used to automate these orders, putting them in one portal that makes it easier to manage incoming supplier shipments and outgoing customer shipments, and to verify that operational constraints such as minimum order quantity and full truckload are met.

The order process can be streamlined using automation, leading to greater efficiency in warehouse planning as there is up-to-date order information at hand – which is further continually updated using AI and reduces the need for updating manually.

An efficient warehouse is integral to the supply chain, supporting a smooth product journey from component parts all the way to the customer, so it’s essential to ensure processes are in place to aid efficiency and lessen volatility.

Using an AI system can solve issues in the warehouse quickly and accurately while simplifying processes and strengthening communication. Algorithms can automate and coordinate orders, centralise information and accurately forecast to ensure efficient stock levels – all processes that traditionally would be carried out manually. The use of AI and optimisation leads to increased accuracy and speed in orders, improving cycle times and the customer experience.

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