Category Archives: Warehousing

To expand its operation in Indian market, ESR – the Hong Kong-based logistics developer has announced that the company has acquired a 39-acre land in Chennai for Rs 332 crore to tap into the growing demand for warehouses and logistics facilities. Located on SH-48, close to Oragadam junction, the park would be connected by air, road, rail and ports. Abhijit Malkani and Jai Mirpuri, Country Heads of ESR India states, “Due to its strategic location and connectivity to the world through ports, business environment, infrastructure and strong workforce, ESR Oragadam will be well-positioned to cater to the needs of the expanding industries across automobile, auto-ancillary, R&D centres, 3PL’s, E-commerce, electronics, energy, aerospace and defence. This investment is in synergy with ESR’s goal to build a significant portfolio of modern industrial and logistics infrastructure across the country.”

86 per cent of APAC retailers looking to increase investment in intelligent automation by 2022, says, 12th Annual APAC Shoppers Study by Zebra Technologies. With the businesses reopening and rebuilding from the COVID-19 pandemic, the resiliency of retailers and supply chains are being tested more now than ever before. One monumental shift relates to the concept of ‘economy at home’, which addresses the way consumers have completely changed their shopping habits. To meet rising customer expectations, retailers need to rethink the safety of the customer journey, whether it is in store or via delivery. Click-and-collect, or buy online, pick-up in store (BOPIS), are becoming preferred methods of shopping, with 55% of consumers requesting more retailers to offer mobile ordering options. This is forcing businesses to rethink their fulfillment strategies given that only 36 per cent of respondents agreed that their stores are equipped to fulfil web orders. The study expects this trend to continue, while retailers implement additional solutions that minimize in-store contact and improve customer convenience at the same time. “COVID-19 has significantly altered the retail sector, forcing both essential and non-essential retailers to assess their Omni channel fulfilment capabilities and quickly adapt their operating models in a matter of days – some implementing changes within hours,” said Deep Agarwal, Regional Sales Director of India, Zebra Technologies. “We’re seeing how retailers are transforming ‘dark stores’ to serve as temporary distribution facilities inside their establishments. Retailers should prioritize the expansion of click-and-collect service offerings and invest in technologies that increase shopping capacity and speed. This reduces in-store traffic and aids in social distancing efforts, while providing retailers with inventory visibility across every corner of the shop floor.”

In order to enhance the efficiency of ULD operations in the global network of their customers, Unilode Aviation Solutions and dnata have signed an agreement to equip all dnata warehouses with Unilode’s Bluetooth readers. Unilode’s digital solution transmits data on the geolocation of the ULDs and can also share other relevant information such as temperature, humidity, shock and light, using ULDs equipped with Bluetooth digital tags and a network of bluetooth readers and mobile devices. Benoit Dumont, CEO, Unilode, said, “Unilode is currently digitising its entire ULD fleet of 140,000 units with tags and is rolling out a bluetooth reader network infrastructure in over 250 locations worldwide. Our new agreement with dnata will help us accelerate the creation of Unilode’s digital ecosystem and enable us to increase ULD visibility, data accuracy and asset stock control, in addition to providing our customers with important information on their cargo.”

Amazon India has announced its plan to open 10 new Fulfillment Centres (FC) across the country. These new FCs will be set up in Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Patna, Lucknow, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Chennai, Ludhiana and Ahmedabad. All new fulfillment centres will be operational before the festive season. With this expansion, Amazon.in will have more than 60 FCs in 15 states, with a total storage capacity of over 32 million cubic feet. The new additions include the specialised network of FCs for large appliances and furniture category and receive centers. “With the expanded network of more than 60 fulfillment centres, we look forward to creating thousands of job opportunities with competitive pay,” said Akhil Saxena, VP, Customer Fulfillment Operations (APAC, MENA & LATAM), Amazon India.

Calling digitalising the complete supply chain a need of the hour, Nihar Parida, Industry Expert & Supply Chain Consultant, says, “Data at every point should be captured as much as possible. Also, data analysis should happen at a single point and not in silos.” He continues, “During the change in tax from local sales tax to VAT, most organisations opened warehouses in every state. The moment GST was declared; the finance and logistics fraternity started exploring how they could consolidate their stocks in few warehouses as the state borders became obsolete from the tax point of view. For the first time, the logistics people started thinking of inventory from a logistics cost saving perspective rather than a tax saving perspective. But again most were guided by the common thought of consolidation. The LSPs also started selling the idea to ensure they could save cost in their multi-user facilities. The distribution factor was side-lined. The transporters and the courier companies were in the limelight.”

With a leasable area of 3.2 million sqft and an estimated investment of Rs 900 crore, Welspun One Logistics Parks (WOLP) has launched its maiden 110 acre Grade A warehousing park in Bhiwandi, Maharastra. The company has also entered into an MoU with the State Government of Maharashtra under the ‘Magnetic Maharashtra Initiative’ for this project, which is in advanced stages of receiving necessary approvals under the Integrated Logistics Parks (ILP) policy of the state of Maharashtra; making it one the first of its kind fully compliant projects in Bhiwandi. This development will create an upwards of 2700 multi-level job opportunities. Anshul Singhal, Managing Director, Welspun One says, “Our park in Bhiwandi is well suited to meet the requirements of a large number of end users including e-commerce, 3PL, FMCG/FMCD, modern retail, pharma and thus far has been very well received by large occupiers. We are also seeing significant interest from international and private equity investors, both at the project and overall platform level.”

Snowman Logistics has announced capacity expansion by adding to their pallet capacity across the country. The company has commenced construction at the Siliguri facility and is further adding pallet capacity to Taloja and Krishnapattanam facilities taking the total pallet capacity to 1,13,208 with a presence in 16 cities catering to the key markets of Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, and Kolkata. Snowman will add 4200 pallets at Siliguri and will expand Taloja (Mumbai) and Krishnapattanam facilities by a total of 3000 pallets. All these facilities are scheduled to be up and running before this financial year-end. The company caters to its comprehensive network of reputed clients, which source and consume temperature-sensitive products in bulk amounts.

With people and transportation constantly flowing in and out of the warehouse property, it’s a constant hub of activity. It puts them at risk for many things, like a fire, or a flood, product damage, or employee safety. Among them, theft is a critical problem. Warehouses have commonly incorporated video cameras to help catch activity going on in and around the property. But in most cases, when loss is identified, the warehouse manager or security staff turn to the video security system to search for the right footage. The challenge is that there is an ocean of video footage, and sometimes none of it clearly tells what happened. This makes forensic search difficult and time-consuming. In short, conventional video monitoring systems cannot effectively help identify an intrusion event at the time it is happening and thus prevent at the very beginning. Accurate trespassing alarm Video monitoring with accurate trespassing alerts on the detection of a human intrusion event will be a great improvement. Today’s security products equipped with Prama Hikvision’s AcuSense technology automatically send out alerts when a human or a vehicle is detected. With an advanced deep learning algorithm, technology precisely distinguishes and categorizes objects into human, vehicle and other. Alarms triggered by the ‘other’ objects such as a beam of light, an animal, the movement of foliage, etc., are disregarded, leaving the true events which are associated with humans and vehicles for users and security personnel to focus and act. Additionally, related videos are automatically sorted by categories for easier search. Focused technology in action So in the warehouse setup, AcuSense cameras are installed to stay alert day and night. If an intruder enters an area of attention, …

“In order to streamline the logistics eco-system in the country, a National Logistics Efficiency and Advancement Predictability & Safety Act (NLEAPS) is under consideration,” informs, Pawan Agarwal, Special Secretary (Logistics), Ministry of Commerce & Industry at a webinar organized by the PHD Chambers of Commerce. Stressing on defining the various elements in the logistics sector, he says, “What the logistics sector is all about is not very clear to us as of now. The government is considering replacing the multimodal transportation of goods law with national logistics law to promote growth of the sector.” “The high logistics cost of country is impacting the competitiveness of domestic goods in the international market. India’s logistics sector is highly fragmented and the government aims to reduce the logistics cost from the present 14 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product to less than 10 per cent,” tells Agarwal. He continues, “During the times of COVID-19, there has been a disruption in the supply chain and movement of truck with many of the supplies diverting to the rail; making it a reliable and cost effective mode of transportation. In these indispensable times, we have realised the importance of essential services with their regular supply chains,” he adds. According to Agarwal, digitisation of logistics is the need of the hour which will increase the efficiency in movement of goods. He also informs that the government is working on creating digital platforms and mobiles apps for logistics such as warehouse information tracking and trading yard (WITTY), among others to mapping of warehouses. Agarwal believes that logistics is a sector that needs to realise the vision of ‘Aatma Nirbhar Bharat’.

In India 60 per cent transportation was by road where as it is much more by waterways in other countries. At the webinar held by Domestic Air Cargo Agents Association of India (DACAAI), Suman P Singh, Joint Secretary – Logistics, MoRTH informs, “We are working on 35 Multimodal Logistic Parks with connectivity of rail, road, air and sea to reduce freight charges and handling charges.” He continues, “Our warehouses have to be bigger and mechanised in order to attain economies of scale. On procedural part, ministry is working on fully automated multimodal logistic parks in paperless mode.” “The multimodal parks at Chennai, Nagpur & Aizwal are getting operational,” Singh informs.