By aditya.agarkar on April 5, 2007 4:28 PM
I often get queries about WMS functionality, how to set up and other implementation issues. Many of these questions are handled very well in the latest WMS implementation guide. However for more important topics we also have White Papers and they are all available on Metalink. I have compiled a list of useful whitepapers available on Metalink. The list entries are hyperlinked to the Metalink notes pages (Metalink user and password needed):
By aditya.agarkar on April 9, 2007 4:33 PM
The MMH article concludes that the next big wave in development of Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is software. The first wave as we all know was all about RFID tags, RFID readers and standards. In the last few years we have seen a plethora of readers, tags and standards emerge and then become obsolete. The newer tags and readers based on Class 1 Gen2 standard protocol hold tremendous potential: interoperability between heterogeneous tags and readers, better and faster
read rates, uniform tag standards for use in extended supply chain, improvised security etc. The EPCIS standards would make it easier to share RFID data. With hardware and standards issues mainly addressed, the next wave of development will be software. What will be some of the development in this wave? Some thoughts:
Software improvements for RFID enablement: RFID enabling an application flow is still a cumbersome process. Expect improvements in this area that makes it easier to orchestrate an RFID flow.
Mobile RFID Applications: Advances in RFID hardware mean that RFID reader can be small and powerful enough to be deployed in a mobile environment. Already these handheld devices are commercially available from Motorola, Intermec and others. What does this mean for handheld transactions that are designed for barcode entry? With RFID reader deployed on a mobile device, its possible to simultaneously read multiple products/containers. This requires a paradigm shift in current crop of mobile applications that are designed to serially process each barcode read.
Packaged software for RFID applications: As RFID software evolves, expect more choices for off the shelf software involving little or no customization.
Sensor based computing: RFID is just another sensor based technology. There are many more areas where a physical world device needs an interface to the application systems. Manufacturing applications needs interface with manufacturing execution systems. WMS needs integration with material handling equipments like conveyors, guided vehicles, robots, etc. A unified approach to handling all sensor technologies is clearly beneficial to all.
Feature rich software at lower price points: As software evolves, one can expect more robust functionality. Wider adoption and usage would also lower the price point for standard software.
Collaboration and Analyitcs: RFID software can generate vast amount of data in the extended supply chain. A number of smaller suppliers to big box retailers, see little value or ROI in complying with RFID mandates. Even the raw data coming from such systems may be meaningless without sophisticated collaboration mechanism and analysis. Software can come to rescue here. It can facilitate data sharing and provide meaningful analytics.
Just like the RFID technology, RFID software is also evolving. Very rapidly if I can say so! I will elaborate on this chain of thought in a subsequent post. Meanwhile some useful links:
Oracle RFID and Sensor-Based Services
Oracle WMS Data Sheet
Warehouse Control System (WCS)/Material Handling Equipment (MHE) Integration
By aditya.agarkar on April 9, 2007 6:48 PM
By aditya.agarkar on April 10, 2007 9:26 PM
If you do not follow the latest news in Oracle Applications space, you can be excused for feigning ignorance about Collaborate 07 conference. The user group conference jointly organized by the
Independent Oracle Users Group
(IOUG), the
Oracle Applications Users Group
(OAUG) and
Quest International Users Group
(Quest) is happening in Las Vegas from April 15-19th, 2007. It promises to be one of the biggest user group conference with over 6000 (and counting) attendees.
If you plan to attend, do visit the session on WMS and Transportation
Transportation and Warehouse: Creating an
Effective Logistics Foundation
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
3:30 PM-4:30 PM
Breakers C
Those of you who plan to be in Sin City on Sunday may also want to attend the WMS SIG. Hopefully it will be worth your time on Sunday morning.
Warehouse Management System SIG
Sunday, April 15, 2007
9:15 AM-10:30 AM
If you can not attend the gala event in Vegas,
check back this site for news and links to my presentation material.
By Daio Syngkon on April 12, 2007 11:35 AM
Some additional thoughts on when to perform cross docking: Depending on the length of the order lifecycle of your business, choosing when to cross dock is an important factor to consider when adopting cross docking. We all know of course that cross docking reduces working capital, reduces labor for putting away inventory etc.
Future Supplies that demands are tagged against need to be monitored for changes to shipment schedules, damages on the way and other reasons, it is a good idea to perform one last round of checking that the crossdocked ASN, PO is indeed on-time just before waving the orders down to the execution system. In a networked fulfillment environment, this may improve fill rates as substitute material or cross docking opportunities may exist in other DC's if there is a problem in supplies arriving.
By aditya.agarkar on April 22, 2007 4:03 PM
I am back from Las Vegas after attending Collaborate'07. The conference lived up to expectations with record attendees (6000+) and exhibitors (50+?). The conference was well organized with excellent sessions and well planned demo grounds. From a Warehousing and Distribution perspective there were these sessions:
WMS SIG: Despite the schedule on a Sunday morning at 9:15 AM, it was very well attended. In the first part of the session, I covered a summary of challenges that are faced by Warehouses today and how Oracle WMS features address those challenges. The second part of the presentation was done by Walt Zipperman from DAZ Systems. Walt did a great presentation on an actual WMS implementation which his team managed to successfully complete in just under 3 months! Isn't that incredible?
There were a lot of questions about WMS R12 and actual customer case studies. I personally thought that this session was time well spent on a Sunday morning away from home. However it would be nice to reach a much wider user base in the future. One of the ideas that I am pursuing is to have a regular Webcast (once in 2 months or so) about WMS. Debbie Arnold, Organizer of WMS SIG at OAUG, thought this was a good idea and promised to provide support. If you have any other ideas, we would love to hear them.
This is a very interesting case study of direct ship being used in a manufacturing crossdock environment. Incidentally by using R12 Planned Crossdock feature, this process can be enabled for incoming supply from "Back to Back" orders, WIP jobs for non ATO items and even purchase orders for non-procure to order items. If the LPN is RFID tagged, the ship confirm transaction can also be done using RFID scan through a reader portal.
I am not sure if the presentation material is available on-line for those who registered. I will provide a link if I find it.
Update: The presentation material is available online
here. Thanks Patrick for providing the link.
By aditya.agarkar on April 25, 2007 2:15 PM
In one of my previous posts, I blogged about facilitating "Just in Time" crossdocking from your assembly line directly to a shipping dock. The objective is to finish assembly completion into an LPN, move it directly to a staging area and then ship it. This process has obvious benefits such as:
Reduction in inventory, storage and thereby carrying costs
Minimal material handling and therefore reduction in labor and equipment costs
Reduction in lead time and therefore faster shipment
In order to make this process work, you need to tie the WIP job to a sales order using either the new planned crossdocking functionality in R12 or using ATO feature. Either way your WIP job will be reserved to the sales order. To further optimize the process, you need to minimize "contacts" for the shipping container and you might want to consider the following ideas:
Shipping Label at Manufacturing: To minimize material handling, you would want to create a shipping label directly at WIP completion for the license plates. The labels can be customer specific that include the customer name, address and purchase order number. By labeling the license plates at WIP completion, the shipping process can be simplified because no additional labeling steps may be required as part of the outbound flows. However the customer data is not available on any labels at WIP completion. You will need to use the "Custom Label Field" feature in R12 to fetch the shipping information e.g. a custom label field can be defined for order number as follows. In this example the return value of the following SQL is mapped to custom label field defined for order number:
Select A.ORDER_NUMBER FROM OE_ORDER_HEADERS_ALL A, MTL_RESERVATIONS B,
WMS_LABEL_REQUESTS WLR, OE_ORDER_LINES_ALL D
where WLR.ORGANIZATION_ID
= B.ORGANIZATION_ID
and B.ORGANIZATION_ID = D.SHIP_FROM_ORG_ID
and
D.HEADER_ID = A.HEADER_ID
and D.INVENTORY_ITEM_ID = B.INVENTORY_ITEM_ID
and B.DEMAND_SOURCE_LINE_ID = D.LINE_ID
and WLR.LPN_ID = B.LPN_ID
Conveyor for Staging Move: After assembly completion and labeling, you can have the operator drop the LPN on a conveyor with a fixed mount barcode reader and divertor that directs the LPN to the correct outbound dock based on the reservation and the dock schedule for the order. If you wish, you can also have an in-line weighing scale that verifies the actual weight of the container to its standard weight and diverts it to a manual inspection area based on a tolerance.
Update: The query mentioned above has been corrected. Thanks to Pawan Dwivedi for pointing out the error.
