Supercharge Your Warehouse – How Robotics Skyrocket Order Picking Efficiency
In warehouse operations, shipping, receiving and storage make up less than half of the total activity costs, with most expenses coming from order picking. A study found that over 60% of the time spent on order picking involves walking while writing, searching, and picking accounts for the remaining 40%. Automating the “walking” part of any order-picking operation would significantly enhance overall warehouse productivity.
One strong solution to achieve this is by replacing unnecessary walking time with Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs). Here are three confident strategies on how to accomplish this goal.
Strategy #1: Transporting Items to Employees (“Goods to Person”)
By having an AMR autonomously move goods to a warehouse associate, the time spent walking is greatly reduced. This not only decreases fatigue but also enhances work satisfaction.
Moreover, it improves traceability by automating the QR code scanning process. Increased traceability boosts efficiency, reduces costs, and provides greater product control, thereby protecting the company’s brand.
Omron leverages their expertise and patented products to help manufacturers ensure quality, compliance, and productivity. Omron is unique in offering a full traceability solution, from barcode to cloud. Despite potential high up-front investments, the productivity benefits of AMRs often outweigh the initial costs.
The Omron LD Mobile Robot is a self-navigating AMR designed to move materials in environments with confined passageways and dynamic, populated locations. Unlike traditional autonomously guided vehicles (AGVs), the Omron Mobile Robot requires no facility modifications such as floor magnets or navigational beacons, thus saving deployment costs.
Equipped with Omron’s proprietary software, it navigates intelligently around people and obstacles and can be programmed and functional within a day.
Strategy #2: Transporting Items Between Zones (“Person to Goods”)
This strategy involves dividing the warehouse into separate order-picking zones, each with a dedicated employee. For orders requiring items from multiple zones, an AMR moves between zones, stopping for employees to retrieve items.
Although employees still need to walk, AMRs handle long distances, significantly reducing overall walking time.
Omron TM cobots are tailored for manufacturers aiming to boost production and reduce employee fatigue by automating repetitive tasks such as walking and order picking. These cobots are adaptable to industries ranging from automotive to semiconductors and secondary packaging for food, plastics, and machine tools.
Strategy #3: Transporting Items to a Robot (“Goods to Robot”)
Collaborative robot technology is rapidly advancing, and solutions integrating AMRs with cobots are becoming increasingly efficient. Both AMRs and cobots can operate around the clock with minimal downtime. The OMRON TM S series collaborative robots are designed to enhance the safety of robot operations near humans and automate repetitive tasks.
The next generation of OMRON cobots features an easy-to-use programming interface, enabling engineers of all skill levels to develop robotic solutions successfully. The built-in vision system and calibration tool allow for relocation to different workplaces, with vision tools for pick and place, machine tending, material handling, palletising, and many other applications.
Incorporating Omron’s AMR solutions into warehouse operations for order picking presents a transformative opportunity to enhance efficiency, reduce costs, and improve worker satisfaction. AMRs address the most significant contributor to order-picking expenses by minimising the time spent walking.
Whether employing a “goods to person,” “person to goods,” or “goods to robot” strategy, the benefits of increased traceability, reduced fatigue, and heightened productivity are clear.
As technology advances, the integration of AMRs and cobots will only become more seamless and impactful. Embracing these innovations is not just about keeping pace with industry trends—it’s about setting new standards for operational excellence in the warehouse environment.
Cezanne Gonsior
Omron Electronics (Pty) Ltd
Tel. +27 11 579 2600
info_sa@omron.com
www.industrial.omron.co.za
