Concerns about safety and legalities are restricting the use of drones everywhere, except in one rather surprising place: the great indoors of mega-warehouses. It’s completely legal to fly drones inside a private space, and logistics experts are putting drones to use inside large warehouses to automate certain tasks. Warehouses are finite spaces, and they can
Drones, 3D printing – the past few years have seen innovations that could prove highly disruptive to the traditional supply chain. Lora Cecere, CEO of Supply Chain Insights, serves up her predictions for the 2030 supply chain in this post. The highlights include: Autonomous Supply Chain. Sensors, robotics, and GPS combined into an adaptive, cognitive
Warehouses aren’t in the business of manufacturing, so it might seem irrelevant to apply the precepts of Lean Manufacturing to the logistics industry. However, says author Jeff Maree, there are surprising bottom-line advantages to managing a “lean warehouse.” Lean manufacturing seeks to reduce errors, improve efficiency, and add value – the famous Japanese principle of
The e-commerce juggernaut shows no signs of slowing, as Target demonstrated when it threw down the free-shipping gauntlet to Walmart and Amazon. Many retailers are finding that their online sales outpace their in-store sales to such an extent that they are reducing their expensive retail space and increasing their storage space – a smart move
It’s no secret that Amazon’s warehouse management is state-of-the-art. In its pursuit of ever-faster fulfillment, Amazon has started using a robot-assisted picking system named Kiva. Dave Clark, Amazon’s V.P. of worldwide operations, says, “Kiva’s doing the part that’s not that complicated. It’s just moving inventory around.” People do the part that requires judgement, confirming that
As the song says, “It’s that time of year,” time to take advantage of Section 179, the tax rule that allows you to deduct the full purchase price of business equipment, up to $25,000. New equipment put into service before December 31st can be deducted from your business’s gross income under Section 179. It’s that
The “Internet of Things,” in which all objects will be connected via sensors to a broad digital system, is still in its infancy. While robotic vacuum cleaners and exercise-monitoring clothes are fairly common, such things as self-driving cars are not quite rush-hour ready. However, RFID and on-board intelligence are being successfully combined to create intelligent
When you’re shipping thousands of pairs of military boots each month, as combat footwear supplier Wellco does, shipping errors can get expensive; to quote a famous senator, “Pretty soon you’re talking about real money!” So when Wellco made the commitment to RFID, they jumped in with both feet. Each and every pair of boots Wellco