Are you ready for automation? Learn more about our warehouse automation readiness assessment tool.

Jennifer Hall, Partner at LIDD:

Hello. Hi. It’s the end of the week

Patricia, Director at LIDD:

Already in it.

Jennifer:

I get to say that, which is fun for me. I’m guest hosting today, but more fun for our viewers. Is that you’re here today?

Patricia:

Yes. I’m in Montreal this week and next.

Jennifer:

Yeah. So Patricia, you recently joined LIDD. Shall we start by a little bit about you and introducing yourself, your background and everything you’ve done?

Patricia:

I’d love to introduce myself. I indeed was recently onboarded at LIDD. I’m very happy to be part of the LIDD family and I bring with me some, uh, some, let’s say 25 years of experience in logistics automation that I’ve built up in Europe.

Jennifer:

Very exciting. So I guess that’s part of our topic today is all things logistics, automation. So setting the scene, what is logistics? Automation?

Patricia:

It’s not technology. So we, for logistics, automation, we really talk about automating physical material flows. In different industries, like in warehouses, production areas, fulfilment centres.

Jennifer:

Right. Which I think has been kind of one of the topics very kind of popular these days of all things last mile and getting things out the door very quickly, which I think we’ll touch on a little bit, a little bit later on. Yeah, indeed. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I guess on that vein, what are the reasons that maybe from your past experience that people have found to automate their operations and then kind of nowadays, like what are you seeing as reasons for people to automate?

Patricia:

So of course you have the efficiency, it’ll reduce your logistic costs and, uh, labour shortage mm-hmm. <affirmative> that we, we all have on both continents. Um, but there’s also the attractiveness of the, of the job you imagine that you want to, uh, automate or that you want to attract people to work in, uh, in frozen areas. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, it’s sexier if you could, uh, yeah. Could add some automation into the processes. Um, besides that, of course, um, uh, there’s also the, the attractiveness for customers, if you work with companies which have a certain level of innovation mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, in, in logistic processes, and, um, also the speed of processes that has, uh, um, changed a lot mm-hmm. <affirmative> with, uh, the, the e-commerce, uh, which is booming. Um, you cannot in a manual process deliver your customer on time if you have not, uh, automated your, uh mm-hmm. <affirmative> your processes.

Jennifer:

Yeah. Well, I think that one of the interesting ones that you bring up, and one that’s maybe lesser spoken about is the marketing element. Right? And I know that I’ve got several clients that, okay, it’s not the reason, but it’s definitely part of the discussion, uh, when it comes to do we automate or do we not, it gives them a way to stand out against their competitors if they’re distributing for other folks. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. That’s true. Yeah. And I find that’s maybe one that is less spoken about. Um, the big one about labour, of course, right? There’s, I know that’s a big trend, uh, for us recently, well last, the last set of years. Um, and it’s, I know from my perspective, I’ve got clients, it’s really just a point of getting labour, right? It’s getting labour, getting the, a right amount of labour, getting reliable labour. And so this has been a trend I’ve seen with, with a lot of our clients. The reason why we’ve had a lot of, uh, inquiries into different types of work that we’re doing with them. Um, so I’m not sure, is that in Europe? Has that been more of the push or is the Europe trend more been from kind of square footage and size and things like that?

Patricia:

Indeed, in the past, the, the reason to automate were different in both continents, uh, in the US and Canada, you’ve been more focusing on, um, adding and extending warehouses. Uh, in case of volume increase, uh, warehouses were extended, people were added, uh, equipment was added. And then, um, the automation was more focused on, um, automating internal transport. Okay. Because that was, was a, a, an important cost at that time, AGVs, AMRs, but, um, in Europe we have, um, we had problems related to, uh, to the cost of, uh, of land and the shortage of land. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So that’s why in the past the focus there was more on high base solution. And we see these days that both solutions meet because we all have now a shortage of, of flavour. And, um, on top of having now combined solutions, which is very interesting in automating with high base and internal transport, we have of course all, uh, recent technologies related to EMRs and robotics. So it’s, uh, really a fun and, uh, time and, uh, interesting times for you and me as logistic engineers to have a interesting project with our customers.

Jennifer:

I mean, I guess just touching on that, so how do you see the A M R and robotics, uh, solutions changing the landscape a little bit? What nuances are you seeing there?

Patricia:

Um, in the beginning it was more theoretical solutions, but now, nowadays, really those solutions, they, they, they work mm-hmm. <affirmative>, they are in place. And, uh, it’s also important to that, that, uh, we, um, we help our customers towards realistic solutions. Yeah. And, uh, and that’s why it’s an interesting, uh, evolution related to robotics.

Jennifer:

Yeah. Yeah. And it’s, I think it’s interesting as well, the sort of, the AMRs is kind of very a hot topic, and it becomes a solution that is not as disruptive to implement as some of these other, um, automated solutions that’s often attractive. And then also the ability to maybe offset some large upfront CapEx costs, shift that over to another kind of way to fund it through opex and things like that. So just, I’ve noticed that for the kinds that we speak with, it becomes a little bit more attainable to, to look at ways to enhance operations

Patricia:

And also scalable.

Jennifer:

Okay. Yeah.

Patricia:

Uh, it’s not a black and white, uh, solution. Yeah. Yeah. You can really go, um, in steps and have a step based approach and a scalable solution, and, uh, that’s, uh, that’s interesting about it.

Jennifer:

Yeah, definitely. I guess with, with automation being more spoken about, at least in North America, Europe’s been, been a while, but at least in in North America, what would you classify as the challenges that people run into, whether that’s when they’re starting their to think about it or once it’s out and going, like, what are things that people experience?

Patricia:

The challenge I see is that, um, once you have chosen your solution and equipment, it’s more than, uh, sending the, um, the approval to the defender and wait until the defender comes on site to, to instal the equipment. Um, in, at that moment, after having chosen solution and before implementation, there is a phase where you need to get your organisation prepared for Okay. Automation mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And because of that gap that we’ve detected at Lit, we’ve launched, um, an assessment tool recently mm-hmm.

Jennifer:

<affirmative>. Yeah. Yeah. Do you wanna talk a little bit more about that assessment tool? Like what is it, who is it intended for? What are we trying to do with it?

Patricia:

Um, you can find indeed on our website, uh,

Jennifer:

And probably in the show notes.

Jennifer:

If Jeremy does his job, right?

Patricia:

Yeah, yeah. Indeed. Uh, so, uh, it’s a, it’s a readiness, uh mm-hmm. <affirmative> tool, so gets ready for automation. It’s an assessment tool where, um, companies can assess themselves to, um, get to know their, um, level of preparedness, uh, before logistics automation. So it, um, it’s, um, guides you through 10 questions Okay. Related to business changes to your facility, building maintenance, but also IT communication, so different topics which are really important mm-hmm. <affirmative> that you need to prepare before implementation. Okay. That’s, um,

Jennifer:

Is there one of those 10 that you find is always kind of the forgotten child, uh, when people are starting their journeys?

Patricia:

Um, yes. The, the communication is very important that you have all stakeholders, all operators, even in related logistic processes that they know what will happen in, in the company and what equipment will do and what it’ll not do, eh mm-hmm. <affirmative>, will it yes or no impact their, their, uh, their, their job. Yeah. Um, that’s an important one. And also the, the risk management. Okay. The, the financial risks, the, uh, implementation risk. If you, if you’re not assessing, um, all the topics that we have implemented, uh, yeah. And introduced in the tool, um, you have a risk of, uh, financial risk, operational risk. Um, so it’s a, it’s an important, uh, step for companies to, uh, yeah. Just to prepare. To be prepared. Yeah. To

Jennifer:

Be prepared. I guess just picking on one of those, just picking on the, on the communication one. Mm-hmm. What are some ways that folks, uh, what are some things that they can do in order to have better communication and ultimately have better rollout of this?

Patricia:

Yeah. It’s to, to put all stakeholders around the table, to, to show them the solution uhhuh and, uh, to make a link with the impact in their job. Imagine the maintenance manager should be, uh, involved in the project. What’s purpose? Will he need to be mm-hmm. <affirmative> to have onsite? Um, how will he store them? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but because if you have only had material handling equipment in the past, and now you’re going to complete other type of, uh, automation and technical stuff in, in the warehouse. Yeah. Um, you, you want also those, those people to be involved. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, maybe they need to hire an extra, uh, other type of engineer. Yeah.

Jennifer:

It’s a different skill

Patricia:

Set. Indeed. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s are also things that we, um, we incorporate in the review of the business case in that phase, because only if you have talk with all stakeholders, you can make a final, um, business case and a final, you have a, a good view on the final return on investment, and you want to have your investment. Of course. Yeah. Uh, maximise the, yeah.

Jennifer:

Yeah. Well, I know that’s something that you’ve brought up with me a couple of times of just the importance to revisit business cases right along the way, because there are things you’re gonna discover, there’s things that might change throughout, and just the importance of going back to it, ensuring that you really do have a all encompassing, all encompassing costs, all encompassing savings as you, uh, really kind of evaluate and deploy the, the solutions.

Patricia:

Indeed.

Jennifer:

What would you, um, what would you consider, I guess, you know, decisions made, it’s implemented, it’s going, what are things that you’ve seen that people have run into as issues once it’s rolled out their solution?

Patricia:

You mean before or after the implementation of

Jennifer:

This? Let’s, well, I don’t know. You wanna go before first and then we’ll do after.

Patricia:

Yeah, maybe, maybe before Is, is the 10 topics that we, that we assess in the readiness tool. Um, of course those are really important topics. We sometimes it goes wrong. And then after implementation, um, the, the technical education mm-hmm. <affirmative> as well from an operational point of view as well for, um, for the technicians that needs to work with the installation afterwards. Um, sometimes there, there can be some improvements. Uh, okay. But those are things that, uh, within lit, if we do feasibility studies, yeah. We have, uh, um, we help our customers to get the order out. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, then we already take into account those things just to be able to, to prevent, uh, having trouble having

Jennifer:

Some, some, some issues once it’s, once it’s going. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that’s, ’cause there’s different, there’s different levels of service that that vendors or that our clients and it’s kind of conversation can have, um, in terms of getting a support from the different vendors. And I know that’s the conversations that we’re often having with our clients to help them understand, well what’s appropriate for them. Right. Do they want to have that sort of outsource and have support on it, or are they ready internally to take that on? They have the, uh, the folks on board that are interested in doing it and really have the expertise internally. And there’s definitely 1,000,001 ways that they can go about, uh, really that after go live support. And so

Patricia:

That can depend on the size of the company, the size of the equipment and installation. And it can be cultural, um

Jennifer:

Yep.

Patricia:

Aspect also, yeah, every adoption is key. Company has his d n A and, and we adopt in what we see.

Jennifer:

Yeah. No, very fun. Very fun. Um, I think realistically, uh, we’re coming to the end I think of our chat. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, is there any closing remarks that you would like to make to, um, our large audience?

Patricia:

Yes, indeed. Um, I’m really looking forward for people, project managers, um, um, let’s say, um, decision makers of company, which is are in their way of implementing, uh, implementing logistics automation to, yeah. To use the tool. Um, and I’m looking forward to have conversations with them to see, um, what their results was on the tool. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, because there will be some spider diagram, that diagram that comes out of the,

Jennifer:

Okay. So that’s what the, the results look like. It’s a spider diagram, and then is there other kind of information that comes outta it?

Patricia:

Yeah, indeed. You have a, a scale for every topic that you assess. So I’m really looking forward to discuss the results of those, uh, uh, assessments with, uh, potential customers or existing customers,

Jennifer:

So Oh, well, amazing.

Patricia:

Yeah. And I’m also looking forward to reactions of the vendors because also for them it’s important that their customers, um, yeah. Are prepared for

Jennifer:

Hold up their end of the bargain.

Patricia:

Indeed. Fair enough. So that, uh, a fluid implementation for, for automation is, uh, is there.

Jennifer:

Yeah. Oh, well, amazing. So hopefully folks fill it out and we can look at those results and then talk to a few people looking forward. Okay. Well, thank you very much for joining today. Looking

Patricia:

Forward.

Jennifer:

See you guys next time. Thank you.