The Current State of Warehouse Management Systems

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Enhancing WMS with AI-driven orchestration for order fulfillment, inventory and labor.

By: Keith Moore, Contributor

Warehouses face ongoing labor shortages, driven by the rapid growth of e-commerce and a lack of skilled workers. High turnover rates are common due to the physically demanding work and the volatility of certain industries. The rise in e-commerce demand and pressure for faster deliveries have also resulted in a shortage of warehouse space, complicating expansion efforts. Additionally, warehouse management systems (WMS) must seamlessly integrate with other platforms, such as ERP or TMS, but integration challenges can lead to inefficiencies and data silos.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) have emerged as transformative technologies in the warehouse. Warehouse orchestration platforms leverage AI to enhance warehouse operations and improve efficiencies. The warehouse orchestration platform sits on top of a WMS to dynamically orchestrate all activities within the warehouse and make the system more responsive.

WHAT WMS SYSTEMS ARE GOOD AT  AND WHAT THEY ARE NOT

WMS systems are good at managing inventory, inventory age and space; managing a work queue; zoning a distribution center; and effectively cataloging and visualizing all receipt, shipment and order information.

Warehouse Management Systems often come with limitations as complexity is introduced to a site. A WMS is bad at:

• Understanding labor, space and task constraints to optimize full-site operations
• Intelligently allocating inventory and managing cuts
• Creating chained tasks that factor in proximity-to-task for all associates
• Managing receipts and shipments simultaneously to ensure the right inventory movements are optimized
• Transferring inventory across multi-building campuses
• Making complex decisions in unforeseen scenarios, like unexpected spikes in demand
• Managing staff schedules, productivity, or labor allocation based on availability and skill sets
• Providing advanced predictive analytics like demand forecasting, risk management, or multi-warehouse optimization

While the WMS offers functionalities addressing throughput and efficiency, like integrated scanning and directed work, they often fail to optimize processes considering labor, automation and space constraints. This shortfall impacts the warehouse’s ability to balance business objectives effectively. These WMS limitations highlight a gap in these systems’ ability to adapt to and manage the dynamic nature of warehouse operations, directly affecting network metrics and overall performance.

Advanced Technologies Coupled with a WMS Improve Operations

Given the limitations of current systems and the pressures on human workers, there is a clear need for more advanced automation and technology integration in warehouses. This is where a warehouse orchestration platform integrated with a WMS comes into play. By integrating advanced technology like artificial intelligence into their decision-making, warehouses can improve efficiency and contribute significantly to achieving and surpassing desired network metrics. This integration represents the future of warehouse management, where technology and human effort work in harmony.

As warehouse networks grow in size and complexity, the manual decision-making and processes involved in day-to-day operations can overwhelm staff. An orchestration platform can optimize a range of decisions and processes, alleviating the manual burden on staff and providing consistency across all network operations. Automating key workflows and decision-making steps allows the warehouse to operate with fewer errors and greater efficiency.

Warehouse orchestration platforms are centralized systems that coordinate and optimize various workflows, decisions, and processes across a warehouse or network of warehouses. They integrate with existing Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), automation tools, and other operational systems to streamline inventory management, order fulfillment, labor allocation and equipment utilization. The primary goal of an orchestration platform is to automate complex decision-making, reduce manual intervention, and ensure consistency across all warehouse operations.

To implement advanced technologies in a warehouse, companies typically need to collect and manage data from various sources, including sensors, equipment and inventory systems. By leveraging real-time data and advanced AI-based algorithms, a warehouse orchestration platform can dynamically adjust workflows based on changing conditions, such as order volumes, inventory levels, or labor availability. This results in increased efficiency, minimized errors, and enhanced flexibility, enabling warehouses to respond more quickly to fluctuations in demand or operational disruptions. These systems provide visibility into the entire network, coordinating the movement of goods, people, and processes to ensure optimal performance.

Warehouse orchestration platforms are particularly beneficial when warehouses are spread across multiple sites. They ensure that every aspect of warehouse operations — from inventory management to labor allocation and order fulfillment — follows standardized procedures to reduce bottlenecks and improve service levels. These platforms eliminate many manual tasks and decision points that often slow operations, enhancing warehouse productivity and reducing operational costs.

Embracing advanced technologies like AI-powered warehouse orchestration platforms that integrate with a WMS, empowers warehouses to operate with unprecedented efficiency, accuracy and responsiveness, ultimately delivering improved customer service. These orchestration platforms are essential to modern warehouses to enhance operational efficiency, reduce workloads and optimize resource utilization. This level of automation and optimization allows warehouses to meet growing demands for speed and accuracy in today’s fast-paced supply chain environment. WMHS

Keith Moore is the Chief Executive Officer for AutoScheduler.AI. He is focused on bringing the future of technology into warehousing. He works with the top 10 consumer goods, beverage and distribution companies to drive efficiency in distribution centers. AutoScheduler’s solutions integrate with a warehouse management system to orchestrate all critical activities inside and around a facility. Learn more at https://autoscheduler.ai/