Static warehouse area sizing and slotting of a multi-mode forward area

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10956858-B2
Application number	US-201815875121-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 19, 2018
Priority date	Jan 19, 2017
Publication date	Mar 23, 2021
Grant date	Mar 23, 2021

Abstract

A method, apparatus and computer program product for static warehouse area sizing and slotting of a multi-mode forward area. Method includes: receiving article dimensional attributes and demand information of more than article identified by a stock keeping unit (SKU); receiving storage dimensional attributes of more than one storage configuration of pick media; for each of a forward area and a reserve area, receiving a picking cost and a restocking cost for each storage configuration; optimizing slotting of each of the SKUs based upon the article dimensional attributes and the storage dimensional attributes; defining possible designs of the more than one storage configuration up to a maximum size of a facility; calculating a first cost for each design in picking and restocking in the forward area and a second cost for each design in picking from reserve area; and optimizing forward area based upon a difference between first and second costs.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for efficiently configuring a first picking area and a second picking area, wherein the first picking area is associated with a lower cost than the second picking area, wherein the first picking area is associated with one or more picking configurations comprising one or more racks with a rack type selected from a pallet flow rack, a carton flow rack, a decked rack, a unit of steel shelving, and a unit of bin shelving, and wherein each picking configuration includes one or more storage configurations and picking and replenishment policies stored in a memory and accessed by at least one processor, the method comprising:
importing, by the at least one processor, the one or more storage configurations from the memory, wherein the one or more storage configurations comprises a set of stock keeping unit (SKU) data, a set of order data, a set of rack data, and a set of facility data;
defining, by the at least one processor, all possible the one or more storage configurations up to a maximum size of the first picking area;
identifying, by the at least one processor, one or more slots in the first picking area in which a case associated with an SKU is fitted, wherein the identification is based at least in part on one or more of the storage configurations;
determining, by the at least one processor, for each of the one or more picking configurations, an optimal orientation for the case associated with the SKU; and
determining, by the at least one processor, a cost savings associated with a location of the case in the one or more slots in the first picking area, wherein the cost savings is determined for each of the one or more of the storage configurations based on the optimal orientation of the case associated with the SKU;
determining, by the at least one processor, an optimized storage configuration of the first picking area from the one or more storage configurations based on the optimal orientation of the case and the cost savings;
sorting one or more SKUs of the first picking area based on the optimized storage configuration of the first picking area;
dynamically updating, by the at least one processor, the one or more storage configurations of the first picking area based on replenishment of one or more empty slots by the one or more SKUs sorted in the first picking area.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the set of SKU data comprises a length measurement, a width measurement, and a height measurement associated with a numerical SKU identifier.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the set of order data comprises a time, numerical SKU identifier, and quantity identifier associated with an order.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the set of rack data comprises a width measurement, a depth measurement, and a height measurement associated with a shelf of a rack.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the set of facility data comprises a horizontal length measurement of the first picking area and a vertical length of the first picking area.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining, based at least in part on the cost savings associated with the location of the case in the one or more slots in the first picking area, an optimized configuration of the first picking area, the optimized configuration comprising an identification of a rack type, an effective rack size, a size of the first picking area, and a slot type for an item associated with each SKU, wherein a slot is a physical storage location in the warehouse.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein determining the optimized configuration of the first picking area further comprises applying an SKU grown factor and a volume growth factor.

8. The method of claim 7 , further comprising:
detecting a depletion condition under a reorder point associated with a slot in the first picking area of the warehouse; and automatically triggering a replenishment process for each slot associated with the depletion condition.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
defining a forecasting algorithm to determine one or more demand patterns based on at least the set of stock keeping unit (SKU) data, the set of order data, the set of rack data, and the set of facility data.

10. An apparatus for efficiently configuring a first picking area and a second picking area, wherein the first picking area is associated with a lower cost than the second picking area of a warehouse, wherein the first picking area is associated with one or more picking configurations comprising one or more racks with a rack type selected from a pallet flow rack, a carton flow rack, a decked rack, a unit of steel shelving, and a unit of bin shelving, and wherein each picking configuration includes one or more storage configurations and picking and replenishment policies stored in at least one processor and accessed by at least one memory, the apparatus comprising the at least one processor and the at least one memory having program code instructions embodied therein, the at least one memory and program code instructions being configured to, with the at least one processor, direct the apparatus to at least:
import, by the at least one processor, the one or more storage configurations from the at least one memory, wherein the one or more storage configurations comprises a set of stock keeping unit (SKU) data, a set of order data, a set of rack data, and a set of facility data;
define, by the at least one processor, all possible the one or more storage configurations up to a maximum size of the first picking area;
identify, by the at least one processor, one or more slots in the first picking area in which a case associated with an SKU is fitted, wherein the identification is based at least in part on one or more of the storage configurations;
determine, by the at least one processor, for each of the one or more picking configurations, an optimal orientation for the case associated with the SKU; and
determine, by the at least one processor, a cost savings associated with a location of the case in the one or more slots in the first picking area, wherein the cost savings is determined for each of the one or more of the storage configurations based on the optimal orientation of the case associated with the SKU;
determine, by the at least one processor, an optimized storage configuration of the first picking area from the one or more storage configurations based on the optimal orientation of the case and the cost savings;
sort one or more SKUs of the first picking area based on the optimized storage configuration of the first picking area;
dynamically update, by the at least one processor, the one or more storage configurations of the first picking area based on replenishment of one or more empty slots by the one or more SKUs sorted in the first picking area.

11. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the set of SKU data comprises a length measurement, a width measurement, and a height measurement associated with a numerical SKU identifier.

12. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the set of order data comprises a time, numerical SKU identifier, and quantity identifier associated with an order.

13. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the set of rack data comprises a width measurement, a depth measurement, and a height measurement associated with a shelf of a rack.

14. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the set of facility data comprises a horizontal length measurement of the first picking area and a vertical length of the first picking area.

15. The apparatus of claim 10 , further comprising code portions configured to cause the at least one processor to at least:
determin

Assignees

• Intelligrated Headquarters Llc

Inventors

• Jahani Parvaneh

Classifications

• G06Q10/087 Primary

  Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders · CPC title

• G06Q30/0633

  Managing shopping lists, e.g. compiling or processing purchase lists (shipping orders G06Q10/083; order filling G06Q10/087) · CPC title