AUTOMATED WAREHOUSE

Get your automated warehouse thanks to Simco consulting service.
The warehouse relevantly affects the service level (it shall grant suitable lead times through processes and structures aimed to reducing to the minimum errors and damages) and the operation costs (on average approx. one fourth of the total logistic costs); it is therefore clear that it shall not be considered an unavoidable cost but rather one of the levers for competitivity.

AUTOMATED WAREHOUSE? WHY?

In many cases it is recommended to evaluate whether it is profitable to create an automated warehouse, and this shall be done without an attitude flawed by commercial influences or prejudices. It is also worth remembering that especially in case of complex and huge warehouses in many cases an automated warehouse cannot solve all the problems linked to stock and handling; for instance, products whose physical characteristics that are not compatible with the loading units adopted by the automated warehouse or reference codes whose handling level is not the one given them by the automated warehouse since they are too much or too little handled. This is the reason why why it is very important to face the problem, involving as a whole all the functional areas (from reception to shipping, also focusing, for manufacturing companies, on the implementation with the flows from and to the production departments); a logistics consulting company has all the professional requirements needed to face an all-round project in the correct way.

Compared to a few years ago the technological options to solve the problem of warehouse operations through automation, increased a lot and choosing the most suitable ones in terms of performance and return on investment requires a careful activity of analysis, especially when picking activities shall be carried out.

With over more than 30 years of logistic consulting, Simco has designed many automated warehouses for all sectors, applying with success several stock technologies; (single deep, double deep pallet stacker cranes, shuttle stacker cranes for pallets, single and double deep mini-load systems, multi-tool mini-load systems, mini-load systems for packages of various sizes, multi-shuttles, etc.) and a variety of handling heads (conveyors, shuttles, overhead self-powered trolleys, LGVs, anthropomorphic or gantry robots for automated picking etc.).

Our Customers have generally included us both in the Feasibility Study, when the best warehouse solution from the organization and technology point of view shall be selected deciding, among other things, whether to choose an automated warehouse or to adopt more conventional solutions, and in the realization phase where our consultancy focuses on:

• Realisation of the project in details
• Drawing up technical specifications and tender specifications
• Purchase support
• Project Management
• Giving support to testing (FAT and SAT)
• Start up assistance

The development of these activities during the realization phases of the automated warehouses enabled us to acquire a very specialist know-how allowing us to make the solutions to be adopted extremely reliable in terms of organization, layout, technology and calculation of the return on investmentstarting from the very Feasibility Study.

Automated warehouses are quite complex not as much as the technology of the single components involved but rather in relation to the performances that the stock and handling system shall guarantee, mostly concerning the heads; this is why for over 20 years Simco has been developing dynamic simulations with its own tools and know-how.

THE METHOD

FEASABILITY STUDY

It defines the strategic, technological and organisational options to remove weaknesses and reach an excellent level, as to efficiency, accuracy and service. It identifies alternative solutions, which are analysed and presented by setting values in terms of gainable results, budget and investment return, operation costs, operation flexibility, implementation deadlines.

DETAIL PLAN

It is the analytical planning of all the components of the warehouse for the issuing of drawings and technical and functional specifications for the launch of tendering procedures.

REALISATION MANAGEMENT

In co-operation with the customer, we provide a technical support for the render, we verify the technical content and the timing of the project achievement, we carry out the logistic project management and the supervision at the building site with staff training, assistance during tests, start up and commissioning.

PERIODIC MONITORING OF EFFICIENCY

After the commissioning, real results achieved are verified together with the reasons why some targets were not reached. New targets are set in a logic of “continual improvement”.