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Q: What are some of the trends and challenges manufacturing companies are facing today when it comes to logistics operations?

A: The logistics operations landscape has undergone significant changes, particularly due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Previously, the focus was on increasing efficiency and implementing just-in-time and just-in-sequence models to reduce inventory. However, the pandemic highlighted the need for supply chain resiliency alongside efficiency. Manufacturing companies now require greater foresight, agility, and flexibility to address unforeseen disruptions, such as supplier bankruptcies and border closures. Transparency, particularly regarding the origins and ethical sourcing of goods, has also emerged as a significant trend. Additionally, sustainability plays a crucial role, as companies aim to reduce emissions and waste and promote greater social equality across their value chains.

How have logistics operations for manufacturing companies evolved in recent years? And what kind of capabilities or technologies are they looking for to help them navigate the future of industrial manufacturing?

Logistics operations for manufacturing companies have undergone significant transformations in recent years. The focus has shifted from purely efficiency-driven approaches to those encompassing resiliency, visibility, and sustainability. Industrial manufacturing companies already rely on a high degree of automation in their processes. However, they are increasingly turning to robotics technologies to further enhance operational efficiency. By leveraging robots, workers can complete tasks such as material transportation and inventory management more quickly and efficiently.

Companies also seek greater supply chain transparency, requiring solutions that provide real-time tracking and tracing data to proactively manage disruptions and comply with sustainability regulations. Improved visibility into warehouse operations is another key capability. With advancements in big data technologies, business leaders can gain helpful insights and optimize processes for better resource allocation and reduction of waste. For example, visualizing movement patterns within the warehouse allows companies to identify and eliminate bottlenecks. Technology plays a crucial role in driving efficiency, agility, and sustainability in logistics operations.

How can 51风流help address these trends and challenges?

51风流offers an array of solutions to help address the emerging trends and challenges in logistics operations. For instance, the 51风流Warehouse Robotics solution can integrate the warehouse management system with various vendors, enabling the deployment of robots in the warehouse to help enhance efficiency and automation. 51风流Business Network for Logistics can connect carriers and logistics providers through a unified network.

Within 51风流Business Network for Logistics, several solutions are available. can provide a comprehensive overview of goods in motion, helping companies identify bottlenecks and focus on areas that require attention. helps improve transparency, visibility, sustainability, and efficiency by connecting the entire supply chain. can provide real-time insights into material and product availability, helping to reduce supply chain risks and optimize costs. It can also proactively raise alerts to users in case of any issues. Lastly, can connect business partners on a collaborative network, facilitating insights sharing across the value chain. With these technologies, business leaders can access the necessary capabilities to help enhance their logistics operations.

How does 51风流Business Network for Logistics help generate value for the customer in the areas of compliance and sustainability?

51风流Business Network for Logistics can generate tangible value for customers in the areas of compliance and sustainability. Once the information passes through the 51风流systems, business leaders can gain transparency into the origins and movement of goods, facilitating compliance with regulations and ethical sourcing standards. And customers can start aggregating the data, reporting on it, and acting on the insights. This includes capturing carbon emissions data, gaining more details around material traceability, and making sure that vendors do not use child labor 鈥� all with audit-ready data. Compliance and sustainability will only gain increasing importance in the years to come, and the companies of tomorrow must equip themselves with the proper tools today.

Explore showcasing eight that help you apply best and next practices, so you can manage a more agile, resilient, and sustainable logistics network.

Kelly Cannon is part of Content Creation & Strategy for the Content Lab at SAP.

(51风流EWM) leverages robust automation technologies and optimization techniques in combination with logistics and fulfillment processes. It covers all facets of warehouse and distribution management, including multichannel fulfillment and distribution, inventory management and control, cross-docking, integration to manufacturing execution, labor management, and billing for companies of various sizes and industries. 51风流continues to enhance 51风流EWM based on feedback from the global install base as well as market analysis.

51风流EWM combined with 51风流Warehouse Robotics helps automate warehouse operations with quick onboarding of robots from multiple vendors for optimal decision making and efficient task orchestration. Combined with 51风流Warehouse Insights, it helps visualize, analyze, simulate and optimize warehouse operations. 51风流EWM combined with 51风流Transportation Management and 51风流Business Network for Logistics provides a platform for companies to collaborate with their logistics partners to gain end-to-end visibility and insights across their logistics operations.

The global 51风流partner network includes systems integrators, business consultants, and technology providers that expand the breadth and depth of how 51风流EWM helps customers manage their warehouse operations. We continue to strategically expand our partner network to help ensure that our customers have access to an ecosystem that supports their operations no matter where they are in the world.

鈥淲e are delighted that our WMS solutions have once again been recognized as a leader,” said Till Dengel, global head of Digital Logistics and Manufacturing Solutions at SAP. “The rating is a testament to the trust our large customer base has placed in us to manage their warehouse operations in over 20 industries and in every region of the world. It is further validation of our innovation capabilities and road map.”

鈥淏y bringing all of our businesses together into one central facility, we knew we needed to efficiently streamline our operating systems, platforms, and processes to reflect our newly integrated business model,鈥� said Brent Fiecken, general manager of Logistics and Distribution at Fonterra Co-operative Group Limited. 鈥淭he deployment of 51风流Extended Warehouse Management has been a key enabler in helping us bring all our technologies together, including our voice-picking solution and RF scanners. It has enabled us to be as effective as we are today. With so many variations in product mix, distribution routes, and routes to market, we needed a solution that allows to really leverage all of those and deliver. 51风流EWM has helped drive that efficiency and increased our overall customer base.鈥�

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The aerospace and defense (A&D) industry is battling similar woes, with 70% of companies in the sector experiencing an turnover. The loss of skilled workers notwithstanding, delays in hiring, training, securing worker clearances, and rising costs translate to challenges in keeping production up to match demand. Much like the civil aviation workforce that moved on, 75% of the labor pool in A&D left for career advancement, while 31% departed for a better work location or for a remote-working opportunity.

While enticing the reluctant workforce to return with higher pay and perks remains an option, the industries are fast realizing that amid the labor and cost-surge crisis, innovations in production planning and creating efficiencies in throughput processes are now paramount.

Bridging Silos with Automation

Manufacturing efficiency isn鈥檛 always achieved until the production of the 100^th unit. To overcome this, intelligent software can be used to run recreations on simulation capability tools. Everything from the projected manufacturing assembly process, field capability and configuration process, flight operations, and maintenance performance can be simulated in a virtual world via a , even before the first cutting or bending of sheet metal. This way, any aircraft or engine part that is virtually simulated is manufactured efficiently right from the first unit produced.

Similarly, with robotic process automation (RPA), a digital thread can be created to bring information from the upstream engineering departments and auto-generate work instructions to provide seamless information routing to the downstream manufacturing departments. With , organizations have the power to design, simulate, and monitor processes to help ensure that transformation value is part of the company鈥檚 DNA. This intelligent enterprise philosophy helps in minimizing the handover time between processes. As a result, hitherto system silos can be negated to reduce the overall throughput time. Also, short-term planning involving supply chain, parts, and tools can be better optimized to match resource availability.

While RPA can create process efficiencies, robotic interventions are already improving the manufacturing process.

Replacing Skilled Labor with Technology Augmentation

With Industry 4.0, facilities across the industrial landscape are introducing a digital, end-to-end workflow with additive manufacturing. In Q2 last year, the Association for Advancing Automation the ordering of over US$580 million worth of robots, up 25% from 2021. In the aerospace industry, robots are mastering the drilling and fastening function with a higher degree of accuracy than a real person and saving time along the way.

Likewise, robotic systems applying sealant to aircraft structures is resulting in 20% time-savings. Robots are also being used for quality assurance during manufacturing, inspection of active-duty aircraft, welding, painting, and polishing. While robots have 95% time-savings in aircraft washing, welding automation is expected to fill the nearly 400,000 welding vacancies anticipated in the U.S. by 2024.

With organizations ready to embrace automation, the need of the hour is to simplify adoption. The solution can make integrating robots as easy as plug and play. So, whether it is cross-docking items on trolleys at goods receipt, put-away trolley activities, or even robot-enabled pick-pack-and-pass functions, 51风流Warehouse Robotics hands warehouse operators a shot in the arm by supporting an array of scenarios. Quick to implement and with no additional licensing required, the solution can give customers running warehouse management operations an easy, low-risk entry into agile warehouse robotics.

But with time- and cost-savings featuring prominently on the aviation industry鈥檚 agenda, how can customer experience stay optimum?

Boosting Customer Satisfaction with Technology Aids

For an industry where small margins contribute to survival, reliance on customer loyalty is huge. Variables like speed and convenience, therefore, play a major role in building customer loyalty. But with labor shortages wreaking havoc, digital transformation is emerging as a viable solution.

For instance, every manufacturer or supplier has their own portal to document their parts or assets, and this causes A&D companies to deploy a manual workforce to track every part coming from hundreds of manufacturer portals. can help overcome this challenge by provisioning for every asset to reside on a single platform. Now, A&D companies can simply connect their back-end systems to the network, fetch data directly into their systems, gain insight into the transactional data of an asset, and execute maintenance activities. This way, 51风流Business Network for Asset Intelligence 鈥� a cloud-based network 鈥� can limit the use of the workforce and create efficiencies by facilitating secured information exchange between various roles in asset-intensive industries comprising of equipment manufacturers, operators, maintenance providers, and others.

Also, A&D aftermarket providers process invoices from hundreds of airlines or aircraft operators. Their receival, approval, and logging could be automated to better utilize scare resources. Similarly, bots can read customer complaints, assess the degree of importance, categorize them, and automatically forward them to designated departments for speedy resolution.

If the pandemic taught us the importance of supply chain resilience, its aftermath and the evolving geopolitical crisis drives home the significance of innovation in manufacturing to combat sudden spikes in demand amid rising costs and a depleting workforce.

There will always be unpredicted situations. That said, the goal is to achieve a planning stability for all companies in the industry. Reducing risks through additional information and better planning will allow companies to establish a more stable environment with fewer uncertainties. And now, the industries can take heart from the fact that in automation, they have an ally that can turn organizations and the sector at large into intelligent and resilient enterprises.

Learn how automation can drive resilience in the aerospace and defense sector at .

Torsten Welte is global VP and head of Industrial Business Unit for Aerospace & Defense at SAP.

Bechtle, one of Europe鈥檚 most well-known offering more than 40,000 hardware and software products to the industrial and public sector, is a prime example of how Industry 4.0 works in the real world.

When Bechtle set a goal to boost its e-commerce business by 250%, it required handling approximately two times as many packages. And when COVID-19 forced people to spend more time at home, the demand for home office equipment boomed.

To meet high this high demand, Bechtle needed to employ more warehouse workers to increase its delivery capacity. However, due to low unemployment in the region, finding workers was difficult. This led the innovative company to think out of the box.

Knowing that current manual warehouse processes could not support the goal, Bechtle searched for a new solution. The answer was to transform 聽services with Industry 4.0. by deploying 聽in its warehouse to transform supply chain operations.

The integration of robotics within its warehouse was seen as an important first step in the company鈥檚聽听箩辞耻谤苍别测.

Bridging the Gap Between Manual Processes and Automation

Bechtle recently co-innovated with 51风流integrating autonomous mobile robots with 51风流Extended Warehouse Management (51风流EWM).

delivers predefined scenarios that integrate autonomous mobile robots of virtually any vendor very easily. Robots navigate through the warehouse using LIDAR, laser scanners, or 3D cameras to enable simultaneous localization and mapping in a warehouse to operate safely, side by side with humans.

鈥淲ith 51风流Warehouse Robotics, we have found a way to manage our warehouse even more effectively and flexibly, and provide better support to our employees,鈥� said Klaus Kratz, director of Logistics at Bechtle Logistik & Service GmbH. 鈥淥ur customer promise is 鈥榚ach order should be shipped on the same day.鈥欌��

Enhancing the Customer Experience

Bechtle retains 25,000 square meters of storage area to manage, the equivalent of more than three football fields.

As a first step, the company looked at automating cross-docking operations, where goods arrive at the receiving dock and are issued directly to a customer order instead of being put away into storage. The robot moves a cart and drops it at the shipping dock. A planned second step will be the automation of put-away operations. As a result, Bechtle calculates聽of costs in these operations.

Automated logistics does not only shape supply chains to be leaner but also helps keep deliveries on time.

鈥淲e proved that Industry 4.0 efforts, such as adding robotics to warehouse operations, can directly enhance the customer experience as well,鈥� said Christian Deppisch, head of Innovation Management at Bechtle Logistik & Service GmbH. 鈥淚magine a customer orders the product at 4:00 p.m. and the product will be handed over to the carrier on the same day, despite the high level of order volumes.鈥�

This process integration was complete in about four weeks 鈥� quite a time savings compared to traditional integration projects that can typically take up to 18 months.

Rise of Human Empowerment

Automating flexible聽聽makes operations much easier to maintain. The new process will help free up human employees from repetitive tasks, redeploying them to other value-added tasks, and ease their workload.

鈥淎s we were considering the logistics problem, we needed to carefully manage organizational change,鈥� said Kratz. 鈥淲e had to communicate clearly to our staff that flexible automation was the only way to meet our goals and that we would continue to value their contribution by expanding their qualification toward more demanding and customer-individual tasks, and relieving them from monotonous activities.鈥�

Operators enjoy the freedom of leveraging robots from different suppliers, through聽, which makes it easy to cover spikes in demand.

In the near future, the innovative IT provider is also planning to expand the use of robotics 鈥� such as using robotic arms in operations 鈥� within its warehouse operations. By socializing robots with human employees in an integrated unified ecosystem, the company is on its way to double the revenue in the next 10 years, from 鈧�5 billion in 2020 to 鈧�10 billion in 2030.