Design and Control of Warehouse Order Picking: a literature review

Order picking has long been identified as the most labour-intensive and costly activity for almost every warehouse; the cost of order picking is estimated to be as much as 55% of the total warehouse operating expense. Any underperformance in order picking can lead to unsatisfactory service and high operational cost for its warehouse, and consequently for the whole supply chain. In order to operate efficiently, the orderpicking process needs to be robustly designed and optimally controlled. This paper gives a literature overview on typical decision problems in design and control of manual order-picking processes. We focus on optimal (internal) layout design, storage assignment methods, routing methods, order batching and zoning. The research in this area has grown rapidly recently. Still, combinations of the above areas have hardly been explored. Order-picking system developments in practice lead to promising new research directions.Order picking;Logistics;Warehouse Management

Materials handling in hospitals: an analysis of how the storage and materials handling system can be improved, using the example of Hospital Santa Maria

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Management from the NOVA – School of Business and EconomicsWarehousing costs and especially order picking costs account for a considerable amount of total logistics costs, what leads to the purpose of this paper which is to elaborate means by which the materials handling process of hospitals can be improved. A detailed analysis of the material storage and picking process at Hospital Santa Maria is carried out in order to demonstrate best practices as well as main limitations for which solutions are developed. The findings are that the introduction of within-aisle storage, electric foldable picking vehicles and pick-by-voice system in combination with the Japanese concept Kaizen can improve warehouse operations drastically

Design and Control of Warehouse Order Picking: a literature review

Order picking has long been identified as the most labour-intensive and costly activity for almost every warehouse; the cost of order picking is estimated to be as much as 55% of the total warehouse operating expense. Any underperformance in order picking can lead to unsatisfactory service and high operational cost for its warehouse, and consequently for the whole supply chain. In order to operate efficiently, the orderpicking process needs to be robustly designed and optimally controlled. This paper gives a literature overview on typical decision problems in design and control of manual order-picking processes. We focus on optimal (internal) layout design, storage assignment methods, routing methods, order batching and zoning. The research in this area has grown rapidly recently. Still, combinations of the above areas have hardly been explored. Order-picking system developments in practice lead to promising new research directions

Improvement of shuttle and lift positioning in an automated warehouse system

The focus of this master’s thesis is to develop methods to improve shuttle and lift fine-positioning in a multi-level automated warehouse system. These methods are to be used in existing sites to improve system performance, as also in future site projects. The multi-level automated warehouse system examined in this thesis study is provided for customer by the system supplier in order to increase efficiency of the warehousing operation. During the system launch, there have been some issues with shuttle and lift positioning, which has led to standstills. In order to ensure best possible perform of the system for the customer, the precision of the shuttle and lift positioning should be improved. This allows minimizing the downtime of the system, and gives customer best possible access to stored items. System performance and error logs were monitored during this master’s thesis work. This allowed identification of individual shuttles and lifts with fine-positioning errors. Operation of these storage retrieval machines were improved by sensor alignment, sensor replacement or with other procedures. As a result of this thesis work, several methods to ease sensor alignment or to improve the positioning process were presented

Robotized Warehouse Systems: Developments and Research Opportunities

Robotized handling systems are increasingly applied in distribution centers. They require little space, provide flexibility in managing varying demand requirements, and are able to work 24/7. This makes them particularly fit for e-commerce operations. This paper reviews new categories of robotized handling systems, such as the shuttle-based storage and retrieval systems, shuttle-based compact storage systems, and robotic mobile fulfillment systems. For each system, we categorize the literature in three groups: system analysis, design optimization, and operations planning and control. Our focus is to identify the research issue and OR modeling methodology adopted to analyze the problem. We find that many new robotic systems and applications have hardly been studied in academic literature, despite their increasing use in practice. Due to unique system features (such as autonomous control, networked and dynamic operation), new models and methods are needed to address the design and operational control challenges for such systems, in particular, for the integration of subsystems. Integrated robotized warehouse systems will form the next category of warehouses. All vital warehouse design, planning and control logic such as methods to design layout, storage and order picking system selection, storage slotting, order batching, picker routing, and picker to order assignment will have to be revisited for new robotized warehouses

Warehouse design and control: framework and literature review

In this paper we present a reference framework and a classification of warehouse design and control problems. Based on this framework, we review the existing literature on warehousing systems and indicate important gaps. In particular, we emphasize the need for design oriented studies, as opposed to the strong analysis oriented research on isolated subproblems that seems to be dominant in the current literature

The procedure proposal for order pick area design

Problem definiranja komisione zone pri projektiranju skladišta je vrlo složen zadatak koji zahtijeva opsežnu analizu i štovanje niza različitih faktora. Konfiguracija komisione zone je u funkciji niza kriterija koji se razlikuju po značaju i utjecaju pri donošenju odluke. U ovom članku predložena je hijerarhijska iterativna procedura za tehnološko uobličavanje komisione zone, čija primjena omogućava minimizaciju troškova uz štovanje zahtjevane razine servisa. Procedura obuhvaća generiranje alternativnih koncepcija komisione zone, određivanje njene veličine i procjenu relevantnih troškova primjenom parcijalnih analitičkih metoda.The problem of order pick area (OPA) defining during warehouse designing is a very complex task that requires a full set of analysis and trade offs of different factors. Configuration of OPA is the function of numerous criteria, which differ by their significance and impact on decision-making. In this paper, hierarchy iterative procedure for technological configuration of picking area is proposed, whose appliance enables cost minimization respecting the required service level. The procedure includes generating alternative concepts, determinating size of OPA and evaluating relevant costs of certain concepts using partial analytical methods

Warehouse design: a systematic literature review

Abstract: This study proposes improving the understanding of the main aspects involved in the design of warehouses by the construction of a framework that reveals the state-of-art.  The initial research bibliography generated a framework, which was structured in three dimensions: inputs; design and implementation; and outputs. The validation of framework was accomplished through a systematic review of the literature, covering 68 articles published in the period 1999- 2015. This study covered the main aspects highlighted in the academic literature that influence the design of warehouses. Additionally, an overview of the publications based on a theoretical/empirical and a quantitative/qualitative approach was pointed out. This paper aims to contribute to both industry and academic. On the one hand, the framework aggregates value for professionals by permitting the rapid identification of variables, which must be considered in warehouse design. On the other hand, by systematizing the warehouse design area, researchers are able to identify gaps that may generate future studies.