Tech Trends in the Digital Era of Distribution.

Consumers need things. Hardly an earth-shattering lede, but that simple fact is what drives economic activity worldwide, makes our ways of life possible, and even governs laws of Mother Nature. To be alive is to always need more—to be a consumer.

What about those of us living totally off the grid? We’re not consumers!

Hate to break it to you, but you—yes, even you—are a consumer, even if you've effectively condensed your supply chain into a single-point, multi-good, micro-managed logistics model. No need to fight it—we all need things and want to get them as efficiently and reliably as possible. No wonder the global logistics market is set to surpass $10 trillion this year.

No way! Isn’t logistics just getting stuff from Point A to Point B? How complicated can it be?

It’s a fair sentiment, but it hardly paints a full picture of the incredible coordination and efficiency required to navigate the challenges of an evolving distribution market and keep consumers like us happy, healthy, and clicking that Track Package icon. As the number of consumers grows and our buying habits and expectations continue to evolve, so too must distribution centers, warehouses, factories, and every stage of logistics to meet the need: the need for speed.

Just-in-Time, Must-in-Time

The mechanics of a successful logistics operation are not entirely unlike the coordination demanded by military maneuvers. In another reality, “Get there firstest with the mostest” might have been an eccentric customer service motto instead of an epigram on gaining martial advantage. Speed, accuracy, and efficiency win the day, and just-in-time (JIT) logistics can improve all three.

JIT logistics is a concept of reaching maximum operational efficiency by limiting inventory, streamlining processes, and cutting lead times. By managing material inflows such that your operation has only just enough supply to meet immediate demand, businesses can focus less on inventory management with its associated waste and overhead costs and more on order fulfillment and quality.

As with any strategy for improvement, JIT involves a degree of risk. It's a narrow ledge that separates perfect order fulfillment from costly problems resulting from bad demand planning and supply chain disruptions. But distributors can address these issues with an ounce of prevention.

Start by implementing the Order Management System (OMS), Warehouse Management System (WMS), or Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) that’s right for your organization, then devote the staffing resources to use this system to its fullest. You’ll gain access to key data to help identify and analyze trends, improve productivity and efficiency, and facilitate a better customer experience, among many other benefits. Next, diversify and localize your supply chain wherever possible and maintain these relationships. With closer proximity and multiple sources for key materials, you’ll ensure that a delay from one supplier doesn’t grind your operation to a halt.

“The whole industry has become more complex and technology-driven. Our customers are leveraging that,?and our partners are more connected than ever.”

Rodney Carpenter

Senior Vice President, Distribution

Gray

In a large-scale industrial climate where even incremental improvements implemented across an organization can result in significant cost savings, JIT can be an effective tool that better integrates your people and processes while enhancing the profitability of your business.

Byte: For those that can master its challenges, just-in-time logistics offers benefits such as reduced overheads and faster deliveries to businesses and their customers.?

With more than 400 distribution projects completed for a diverse set of global customers, Gray offers the tools and expertise to deliver complex facilities with the speed and precision the market demands. Learn more here.

You Wear It Well

The advent of Industry 5.0 has opened opportunities for corporate applications of wearable technology. This is good news for logistics operations, which value clear flow of information, consistent processes, and fast execution.

Wearable, IoT-enabled technology is nothing new—people have been using Apple watches, Fitbits, and Google Glass in private life for more than a decade. Naturally, a single user is nimbler in adopting wearable technology than a multibillion-dollar corporation, yet the big machine is catching on, and wearable technology in a distribution center is becoming standard fare.

Wearable technology offers myriad benefits for the average distribution center worker:

• Ability to scan items quickly and with less manual labor
• Real-time communication between team leaders and employees
• Worker wellness monitoring for greater safety and faster intervention
• Immediate quality control and error notifications

Much wearable technology performs the same function as its handheld predecessor, but the benefit lies in freeing the user’s hands for other tasks—in a word, efficiency.

Practically, an employee picking items from shelves may use Google Glass to quickly conduct a hands-free visual scan of a product instead of using a handheld RF scanner gun. Both devices can communicate with a business’s WMS, but the latter requires time and effort from manual operation. Repeated hundreds of times over the course of a 10-hour shift, this lost time and effort contribute to a significant lack of production.

Other wearable technology is truly without precedent. For instance, augmented reality can allow warehouse pickers to literally see their optimal work route through the vast space, eliminating the frustration of mistakenly wandering down the wrong aisle. Similarly, an employee working on a procedurally complicated manual task can visualize its step-by-step completion in the space while reviewing instructions.

Byte: Wearable technology has been proven effective, honed by years of use from the consumer public. The only question for your logistics application is when, not if, your operation will adopt it.

Who’s Driving What Now?

We’ll round out this issue on logistics trends with a look at the new vehicles transporting goods in style and re-energizing the market. One is hard at work behind the scenes in an order fulfillment center near you, one is transforming the ease and sustainability of working as a delivery driver, and one is taking an unconventional route to bring packages right to your doorstep.

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AMR, Near and Far

Autonomous mobile robots (AMR) are changing the inner workings of distribution centers around the globe, improving efficiency and providing a high-tech solution to the labor shortages endemic to industrial environments.

AMRs can offer advantages to automated guided vehicles (AGV) in versatility and integration with their human counterparts. Where AGV are often bound to fixed work paths by magnetic bands, tracks, or similar systems, AMR can independently operate and respond to obstacles without human intervention.

With AMRs, logistics managers are increasingly automating distribution processes such as picking, packing, sorting, packaging, and other material handling.

It’s Electric

As discussed in a recent issue of Bytes & Insights, automakers are aggressively investing in electric vehicle (EV) production, transitioning to EV fleets at breakneck pace.

In addition to the sustainability benefits of reduced emissions and eliminated fuel costs, these vehicles increasingly incorporate technology to assist drivers.

Leaders in logistics are seizing upon the idea, using the occasion of transitioning to smart, integrated EV fleets to optimize route planning and improve road safety and navigation with semiautonomous software.

Flying Across the Finish Line

Nothing is as make-or-break as the last leg of a race. It’s where participants pull out all the stops and spare no effort. Now, major distributors are taking the message to heart, deploying aerial drones for last-mile delivery. Foodservice businesses and grocers have already used terrestrial “sidewalk” robots to deliver orders to their final destinations since at least 2019, but a flock of aerial drones dropping parachuted LEGOs and wool socks is the embodiment of innovation.

It's also perhaps the most niche logistics trend, with only a select few businesses currently employing this model; Amazon Prime Air, Zipline, and Wingcopter are among the most prominent examples. Don’t expect to see a sky full of delivery drones any time soon, however, as tight regulations from a very concerned Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have significantly limited what operations the drones may perform.

Byte: As the lifeblood of logistics, vehicles have always played a major role in the industry. Thanks to advanced automation and a greater range of sustainable options, it looks like vehicles will be reducing costs and improving efficiency for the long haul.

Logistics service providers are embracing smart, integrated technologies en masse with the knowledge that doing so firstest and mostest will ultimately translate into greater market share and a future-proof business model.

“The market is changing,” says Rodney Carpenter, Gray’s senior vice president of Distribution & Commercial markets. “The whole industry has become more complex and technology-driven. Our customers are leveraging that,?and our partners are more connected than ever. We have the ability to handle complexities and integrate innovative systems into our customers’ facilities.”

But while the contemporary distribution center may look very different today than its predecessors, its fundamental purpose and goals haven’t changed, nor has consumers’ favorite sentence: Thank you, your order will arrive shortly.

For a closer look at the trends transforming how distributors equip and operate their facilities to meet consumer demand, check out the full article.