To a flexible automation

When the demand is unstable or unpredictable and the market is mature, that is to say, exists a strong competition and the prices are adjusted, remains little margin to keep . A tendency in these cases is to bet for automating the surroundings of work, with flexible tools, that adapt to the variation of the volume and of the type of demand.

In the logistical terrain, the technology of storage of shelves has allowed big flexibility, but has not contributed sufficient performance for the picking of products in units. On the other hand, the automatic warehouses on a large scale allow a big efficiency but are not so flexible if the typology of product or customer varies.

The tendency of adaptability and flexibility purchases more importance what more uncertainty exists in the surroundings. Like this, if your business and your surroundings of work play with a variable demand and high competition, an option can be the vertical storage automated. This type of technology comes to be a solution between the manual and the totally automated systems, in terms of efficiency and flexibility. In the following example can see like this flexible automation has helped to a company of the industrial state, in geographic expansion, to improve his daily logistics.

Lidering is a company founded in 1975 with national capital, with headquarters in Cornellà of Llobregat (Barcelona), delegation in Brush Them (Madrid) and subsidiaries in Lyon (France), Düsseldorf (Germany) and Waterloo (Belgium), devoted to the manufacture and commercialisation of mechanical stamps for pumps, boards for hydraulics and pneumatics and other products for the industry.

From the central warehouse, situated in Cornellà, distribute all the expeditions generated by the group of companies, being the destination of the thickness of the expeditions the national market (60%) and the rest, the international. Daily they prepare some 900 lines of request, that generate some 120 expeditions sent by agency and some 40 collected in the shop. The warehouse managed by a SGA own has 25.000 references organised caóticamente, being the materials with more rotation in the Vertical Warehouses and, if the volume does not allow it, in near locations to the zone of manufacturing, being able to be a same placed article in diverse locations.

The area of warehouse is of 1.100 m² and is distributed in the following zones: reception (120 m²), storage paletizado (160 m², 600 locations), storage in conventional shelving (535 m², 16.300 locations), four Vertical Warehouses (75 m², 9.500 locations), manufacturing and expedition of requests (190 m²) and dispatch and meeting room (20 m²).

After the implementation of the Vertical Warehouses, has achieved the aim proposed to free 200 m² of floor of warehouse, has increased the productivity in 15%, keeping the staff and without need to hire more personal, and have diminished the errors in 20%, happening to 0,61 errors/1000 lines.

In the transfer from Barcelona to the current installations (2003), already had the installation of a Vertical Rotary presses Warehouse, being necessary to install other two years afterwards. In the 2011, because of the cession of space to the area of Manufacture and in forecast of the increase of activity with the opening of the subsidiary of Germany, realizar the investment of two Vertical Warehouses Lanzadera.

“Trusted the project to ET Systems, since they were they those that did the first installation in the 2003, and have showed us be fast and resolutivos when there is some problem and sensitive to the solutions of which need small locations of picking. It opted by the option of warehouses lanzadera with double extractor, by his versatility and rapidity”.

Vertical warehouses in the installations of Lidering.