The innovation driving many industries has been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic, with logistics being a key beneficiary. Of course, the news has dominated issues such as the chip shortage and supply chain issues, but the reality is that logistics has been advancing rapidly under the radar.
Automation is the key way in which logistics has progressed. There has been a shortage of skilled forklift operators, for example. Even though there is minimal training required when using an electric hand pallet truck, getting enough staff – and keeping them socially distanced – has been difficult.
As a result, Automated General Vehicles have been booming. Having programmable devices that can carry out tasks in replacement of a forklift has been vital to keeping operations ticking over during a time in which a virus outbreak among staff is inevitable.
The initial investments for AGV and mobile robotics can be quite steep, and they’re somewhat more restricted to repeatable tasks, but there’s no doubt they keep payrolls down and can be operating 24/7. Plus, they use less energy, and don’t require health and safety training as they rarely cause damage to surrounding products or structures.
Another important factor in this trend towards automation is that the pandemic, among other things, has turned away from the high greet and towards e-commerce. Though it’s not just ordering shopping online, it’s the expectation of next day delivery. Streamlining delivery is difficult, but automation has been a huge help.
It’s not just the automation of tasks that’s more efficient for fast delivery, it’s also that there is more data gathered. With a steadier flow of logistics along with better data, management can more accurately predict the likelihood of achieving next day delivery.
The downsides of automation
The greater your processes rely on automation, the less flexibility you potentially have. This is a limitation because if there’s a process that needs changing, a 5-minute simple team meeting in the morning isn’t enough – all vehicles and robotics need to be reprogrammed.
Furthermore, they’re costly to onboard and set up. Whilst it’s possible that you seek only partial automation, it takes a lot of time to implement – possible years – and vast upfront capital costs. This large upfront cost is a huge problem for a fast-growing logistics company because they may be rapidly expanding. This may make it costly to implement a system that isn’t flexible when it needs to be, and requires frequent expansion and amending. Generally, personnel will be more adaptive to an ever-growing process.
The future of automation
It’s not only the processes under the warehouse roof that are advancing quickly, but we’re seeing courier services – the last mile of the supply chain – implement very ambitious automation. Starship Technologies is just one firm that has been using self-driving robots to deliver takeaways to customers’ doors. Whilst this is only happening in MK Dons, Amazon and Co-op are partnering up to use the same robots to deliver same-day groceries. Clearly, next-day delivery will no longer be good enough in the short future.
