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Tag: Order Fulfilment

Kmart Automates new Omni-channel Facility

Posted on by David Priestman

Vanderlande has been selected by Kmart to automate its new logistics facility at the Moorebank Intermodal Precinct in Sydney. To meet the complex needs and demands of one of Australia’s most iconic retail brands, the state-of-the-art warehouse will feature Vanderlande’s FASTPICK goods-to-person
order fulfilment system.

The Kmart Group serves millions of customers per week in over 450 Kmart and Target stores across Australia and New Zealand, as well as through its online platforms and mobile apps. Kmart’s long-term growth ambitions will focus on this omni-channel approach, and address the current challenges of labour availability, rising order volumes, and increasing customer expectations.

The partnership reflects Kmart’s commitment to enhancing operational efficiency and future-proofing its supply chain as it continues to expand across the region. The new 100,000m² omni-channel facility will be equipped with Vanderlande’s advanced FASTPICK solution, combining the intelligent ADAPTO automated storage and retrieval system (AS/RS) with ten ergonomic goods-to-person (GtP) workstations.

The system has been designed to maximise picking speed, flexibility and efficiency, so that the full complexity of both business-to-business (store deliveries) and business-toconsumer (online orders) operations can be seamlessly integrated within a single omnichannel fulfilment centre. For retail distribution, a high-speed crossbelt sorter will handle both cartons and polybags with a high level of precision.

In addition, the Moorebank site will deploy a large fleet of Toyota AGVs and VNA (very narrow aisle) trucks to support internal pallet transport and high-density storage. The entire operation will be controlled by Vanderlande’s VISION warehouse control system, ensuring the intelligent coordination and
management of all processes. Together, these integrated technologies will form a scalable, future-ready platform that is tailored to meet Kmart’s operational requirements.

“The investment in the new Moorebank omni-channel fulfilment centre will be an important part of our long-term strategy to modernise our supply chain and simplify store operations,” explains Phillip Irvine, Kmart’s General Manager – Next Generation Supply Chain. “Ultimately, this approach is about delivering even more value to our customers, which is central to who we are.”

“We are excited to join Kmart on this journey to optimise its supply chain and ensure that this is ready for the future,” says Jordan Thrupp, Vanderlande’s Managing Director Australia. “The strong partnership we’ve built with their team has been instrumental in delivering the best possible solution, and we remain committed to supporting Kmart’s ongoing success.”

Stephan Heessels, Vanderlande’s Executive Vice President for Warehouse Solutions adds: “This project reflects our dedication to delivering scalable systems with fast and efficient order fulfilment. FASTPICK is the optimal solution for leading retailers, such as Kmart, facing unpredictable long-term growth across their store and e-commerce operations.”

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Robot Picking just like the real thing

Posted on by David Priestman

Autonomous, robotic picking of pieces in warehouse order fulfilment relies on sophisticated ‘hand-eye’ coordination. David Schwebel, Vice President of Sales and Strategic Business Development for RightHand Robotics, spoke to David Priestman about the technology at Manifest, Las Vegas.

Massachusetts has always been a hotbed for science and tech. Some of our world’s most beautiful minds come to fruition at MIT and Harvard. So, for industrial robotic picking does this reputation precede itself accurately?

RightHand Robotics, based just outside Boston and founded in 2015, manufacture the most important part of the robotic picking arm – the ‘hand’. This product is called ‘RightPick’. The latest version of this is the RightPick 4 system, which can handle items up to 25% larger and 50% heavier, significantly reducing the need for human intervention. It can be used with various makes of robotic arm and the company collaborate with them on product development.

“We own pick and place and go beyond the limitations of known operations,” David Schwebel (pictured below) tells me. “The product has a broad scope for reach, range and reliability. We want to improve the delivery radius without over-automating, augment brownfield distribution centres and extend their value and longevity. Customers should optimise their DC space before moving.“

Robotic picking is not about replacing people, he argues. “It’s about enabling humans to not be robots. We take the back-breaking lift work. This frees-up staff to add a personal touch to customer order engagement, for example by writing a gift note for the package.”

Pick, place, decant

80% of the company’s sales are channel ones to system integrators such as Vanderlande and Element Logic, with whom is has partner programmes. Historically, RightHand Robotics (RHR) has achieved a mix of sales, with 40% coming from North America and the rest of the world and 60% coming from the EU.

RHR also provides to Movu Robotics the ‘Hand’ (Gripper), the ‘Eye’ (Vision), the ‘Arm’ (UP10e) and the ‘Brain’ (AI / ML software) that is embedded in the eligo presentation station and empowered by the escala shuttle system. What is the snoot, I asked Schwebel. “The Snoot is an extendable mechanism in the middle of our hand (gripper) that allows RHR to engage our myriad of suction cups to the item to be picked; it then retracts the picked item into the grasp of our hand, allowing the item to be safely and quickly moved to its next destination.”

David Schwebel

Pick, place, decant is how the RightPick operates. “That’s meaningless unless the warehouse’s ASRS and conveyors are synched with the picking,” Schwebel explains. “It’s low maintenance. If there is a problem, which is rare, you can cut the power, make a key turn and quickly replace a part. RHR understands that uptime is critical for the end customer (Practitioner), and we have developed our maintenance and repair operations for simple fixes and turn key replacements. For example, if you needed to change out the gripper, it takes less than 25 seconds – disengage the power and air, turn a key, and the entire hand can be changed out for the spare on site.”

Smallest footprint

The RightPick system can provide businesses with vital productivity as part of a lean material handling process. “It has the smallest footprint,” Schwebel points out. “RHR is arm agnostic, and when we use a collaborative arm, the entire footprint needed for a robotic piece picking system is the smallest in the industry.” The system learns as it picks, building a database of knowledge that allows customers to benefit from fleet learning. Each new robot benefits from 100% of the previous experience creating better AI with better analytics, metrics and training data.

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Investment Pays Off, Calmest Peak for 3PL

Posted on by Keith McKinley

Specialist 3PL fulfilment provider Europa Warehouse has reported a 45 per cent increase in total orders picked in December 2023* across its 3PL sites.

Despite this increase, its facilities in Birmingham, Corby, and Dartford – which offer over one million sq. ft combined of dedicated warehouse and logistics space – operated without the usual stress and pressure associated with “peak”.

Notwithstanding continued economic challenges, there was a rise in consumer spending across the period which, supported by figures from Retail Economics, accounted for £202bn worth of global sales online and a 3.7 per cent increase in the UK.

While sales during the 2023 peak season in the UK might be less pronounced in comparison to previous years, the increase in order volumes still puts a huge pressure on 3PL services. Due to Europa’s £70m investment in its logistics operations over recent years, including £11m in shared user automation this peak period was the most efficient of any recent years’ peaks.

Dionne Redpath (pictured), Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Head of Warehouse at Europa Worldwide Group said: “Shopping habits are ever evolving, but we have invested heavily to alleviate the strain on our e-commerce, retail and wholesale customers. As well as investing in new equipment and processes and having restructured in recent months we’ve augmented our approach with customer and consumer experience at heart. Our focus has been to enable customers to meet or exceed their sales targets, allowing them to maximise revenues whilst ensuring exceptionally high levels of quality and satisfaction.”

To make it easier for customers to scale up and achieve seamless fulfilment, Europa Warehouse identified the importance of implementing strategies to drive innovation in order fulfilment.

“We appreciate that our customers need to cost-effectively scale up and down at pace, while delivering an efficient service for their customers. Our overarching objective is to deliver a peak which doesn’t feel like peak at all. During seasonal peaks, e-commerce and retail brands face upsetting their own status quo: with the significant upturn in sales activity creating volatility and complexity resulting in what can be an inefficient, often-chaotic order fulfilment process. It’s the time of year businesses are more likely to experience costly mispicks, delays to dispatch and higher than normal return rates.”

Europa Warehouse is the 3PL division of Europa Worldwide Group, and one of only a few operators in the UK offering a shared-user automated picking system. Designed for products that are able to be stored in totes, which Europa refer to as ‘toteable’, the system is ideal for clients who operate with a large SKU range and a complex, volatile order profile, often requiring operations to dramatically scale up and down within a short period of time.

Redpath explains: “With robust quality control processes to prevent picking errors, thus reducing cost, a shared-user system can be quickly scaled up or down to meet fluctuating demand. In turn, this allows for accurate financial modelling because of the high level of predictability. For peak planning, this is crucial to ensure a seamless supply chain from start to finish whilst not blowing budgets.”

Calmest Peak for 3PL
Calmest Peak for 3PL

In 2023, Europa’s portfolio of warehouses picked 78.8 million units through its automated and manual fulfilment operations – regularly scaling up to 280,000 individual picks in a 24 hour period. Shared-user automation contributed towards this, allowing for regular scaling from 40 to 100,000 picks from one day to the next. The ability to scale in this way within automation is what makes it such a cost-effective solution. The ability to scale in a similar way in a manual environment is far more complex, requiring significantly more labour at a time of year when labour is at a premium. In the automated environment, those headaches simply don’t exist.

The combination of Europa’s most recent investment in its systems and automated fulfilment technology and processes allows e-commerce brands to optimise resources, simplify operational models and capitalise on the sales and growth opportunities afforded by the peak season.

Future of Fulfilment at Puma

Posted on by David Priestman

Since November 2022, stichd, a subsidiary of the Puma Group, has been serving its global customers from its new and highly automated fulfilment centre in Tilburg, the Netherlands. This high-performing and extremely versatile omnichannel solution enables stichd to cut lead times and to offer customers an even higher service level. In close cooperation with TGW, a solution was developed and implemented that ensures a future-proof distribution process.

Unique service requires flexible and future-proof system

stichd specialises in the design, production and distribution of high-quality bodywear, legwear and swimwear. In addition, stichd also designs, develops and distributes licensed fanwear, in cooperation with Formula 1 top teams and with football club Manchester City among others. It is a service-oriented company that also offers its customers value added services (VAS), such as providing price stickers, a new barcode or the customer’s article number on the articles. This requires a flexible approach and a system that can handle many variables.

To lay the foundations for further growth and to improve process efficiency, it sought a partner for the automation of the distribution process. TGW proposed a solution where today’s capacity can be doubled within the current warehouse.

“It was immediately clear to us that FlashPick was the ideal solution for stichd. FlashPick is a smart order fulfilment system for goods-to-person picking that can serve every distribution channel (e-commerce, wholesale and retail). The single-order management approach is ideally suited for omnichannel operations and raises the bar in terms of speed and flexibility,” says Jan-Willem Klinkenberg, Head of Business Development TGW Northern Europe.

At stichd, FlashPick comprises a five-aisle shuttle warehouse with 20 levels, six ergonomic PickCenter One workstations as well as two order-pick robots Rovolution. “This means a quarter of the workstations are robotised,” states Klinkenberg. “For handling fashion, the Rovolution is an ideal application as it picks a wide range of item types, from rigid to soft packaging, such as t-shirts in a polybag for example. Moreover, the Rovolution is deployable 24/7.”

The Warehouse Control System is developed by TGW and provides control and monitoring of all processes. KingDrive transport systems guarantee energy-efficient transport throughout the warehouse. Cartons delivered at goods reception are transported to the pallet reserve warehouse that is used for replenishing FlashPick. Wholesale or retail orders are directly commissioned into shipping cartons. Customer orders can then be delivered to the VAS workstations where additional stickers or barcodes can be added if required.

The design of the logistics centre at stichd already provides the option for a possible doubling of the shuttle block and the connected picking. If stichd continues to grow as dynamically as predicted, the extension could be planned as early as 2025.

Close partnership continues in service contract
From the beginning of the project, there was close and open communication between the TGW and stichd teams. “It is very important for us that the project is also supported internally by the customer and that we get the necessary information. Only when we understand the customers’ requirements and needs, we can design a tailormade system that also generates a good return on investment,” confirms Klinkenberg. “Together with the stichd team, we have dissected the entire distribution process step by step and developed the best solution for each step.”

The close collaboration is continuing even after the go-live of the automated fulfilment centre. An in-house team of six TGW engineers provides preventive maintenance and repair of the system through a Lifetime Services contract for a period of five years.

Long-standing relationship with Puma Group

In 2021 TGW realised the new fulfilment centre of Puma in Geiselwind, Germany. The new omnichannel distribution centre serves all channels from one location and fulfils orders from throughout Europe. In the past, Puma used a decentralized distribution network with local and separate distribution Centres for B2B (retail/wholesale) and B2C (direct-to-consumer). High inventory levels and process costs combined with the fact that Puma could no longer offer its customers the service they expected, made the company decide to consolidate all services in one central fulfilment centre.

TGW deployed a FlashPick solution able to cover both retail/wholesale and e-commerce orders. The high degree of automation also makes it possible to react quickly to changes in the order structures and to do so with consistently high quality.

Fortna and Geek+ Partner for Order Fulfilment

Posted on by David Priestman

FORTNA, a leading automation and software company for the full logistics value chain, is thrilled to announce a global strategic partnership with Geek+, a leader in mobile robotics solutions for logistics. The partnership marks a significant milestone in the industry, as two industry leaders join forces to transform the way companies approach order fulfilment, bringing the revolutionary goods-to-person and mobile sortation systems developed by Geek+ to FORTNA customers.

FORTNA is collaborating with Geek+ to create customized solutions tailored to the unique needs of their customers. This partnership will empower businesses to streamline operations, reduce costs and enhance overall efficiency in order fulfilment.

Through the global partnership, multiple projects are already in different stages of deployment in both the United States and the EMEA region, including major robotic installations for several large retailers in the sports and home appliances sectors as well as innovations in goods-to-person sortation systems. These robotic systems enable customers to add flexibility to their operations while increasing throughput and creating a more positive workplace for their warehouse employees.

Key benefits of this partnership include:

1) Enhanced Efficiency: FORTNA’s extensive industry knowledge will be complemented by Geek+’s state-of-the-art robotics technology, creating highly efficient and adaptable automated solutions. Mobile robotic systems have more than double the average order picking and sorting throughput.
2) Scalability: The collaboration will offer businesses scalable solutions that can grow with their needs, ensuring they remain competitive in an ever-changing marketplace.
3) Optimized Warehouse Operations: By integrating advanced robotics into warehouse operations, customers can significantly improve order accuracy, storage utilization and reduce labor costs. Integrated directly into FORTNA WES™ software, Geek+’s robotics offerings now benefit from order priority adjustments in real-time, enabling businesses to adapt to operational changes more effectively. By coordinating work activities in concert with Geek+’s offerings, FORTNA WES™ is also able to assign tasks to the best-fit automation at the optimal time for further throughput improvements while reducing the cost to pick.
4) Increased Customer Satisfaction: Faster and more accurate order fulfillment will lead to improved consumer satisfaction, loyalty and retention.
5) A Better Workplace: Mobile robotics allow employees to focus on less strenuous tasks in a safer work environment, supporting businesses’ ESG commitments.

Both FORTNA and Geek+ are committed to innovation, sustainability and delivering solutions that align with the latest industry trends and regulations.

“Together with Geek+, we provide our customers with a competitive edge through the seamless integration of automation and robotics into their supply chain operations,” said Robert McKeel, Chief Executive Officer, FORTNA. “The partnership between FORTNA and Geek+ aims to accelerate supply chain automation, making it more efficient and cost-effective and increasing the timely delivery of goods to consumers.”

In a rapidly evolving e-Commerce landscape, the demand for efficient and scalable order fulfilment solutions has never been greater. FORTNA and Geek+ are dedicated to addressing these challenges head-on by combining their expertise to design, develop and implement cutting-edge automated robotic solutions.

Lit Fung, Vice President and Managing Director for International Business Geek+, also expressed his enthusiasm, stating, “The FORTNA and Geek+ partnership signifies another milestone in the robotics shake-up of order fulfilment automation. Companies seeking to enhance their supply chain operations can now leverage the combined expertise of these two industry leaders to achieve greater efficiency and competitiveness in the global marketplace.”

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