How could GPS positioning System(locator) can solve different problems in logistics

The scope of application of GPS positioning system is very extensive, high way patrol, there are precious cargo tracking, car alarm, electric vehicle and motorcycle theft, bank escort( money transfer) or others like Gold, dangerous goods transport, vehicle management relates to the enterprise.

Especially in recent years, the development of the logistics industry rapidly, some problems in the industry highlights exposed: orders lost, damaged goods or mistakes, not very good source of car scheduling using another serious phenomenon, this kind of problem can help improve the GPS vehicle positioning system.

The GPS positioning system consists of two parts: GPS positioning terminal and positioning monitoring platform.

• GPS terminal is the front-end equipment of vehicle monitoring and management system, which is installed in all kinds of vehicles.

The electronic map of the monitoring center can display the visual position of the vehicle and monitor and control the vehicle through the wireless network. At the same time, the monitoring center can realize real-time, centralized and intuitive monitoring and dispatch command for the controllable range of operating vehicles

The GPS positioning system can be implemented by tracking and controlling the vehicle:

• to realize the transparency of the logistics process, the completion of the distribution of goods security, to solve the traditional logistics “goods issued, nothing knows” situation.
• to solve the problem of logistics scheduling and management, keep abreast of the status of each vehicle, the operation level of the logistics enterprise and the ability of vehicle monitoring to be improved.
• personnel management, scheduling more convenient, the whole journey record itinerary, to avoid the bus private, pull private activities, random claims and other phenomena.

The advantages of installing locators are the following:

• real-time positioning, you can always check the vehicle trajectory, although the vehicle was stolen, you can return the vehicle through the track.
• compared to the old version of the car anti-theft device, the current GPS locator can monitor the vehicle through mobile intelligent monitoring, is undoubtedly a qualitative leap in the GPS industry.
• after the car was stolen, you can use the mobile phone or computer platform for vehicle oil, electricity, Anti-theft plus monitoring, open the smart car life.
• of enterprises to reduce more spending and more conducive to the management company, often a handful of employees often carts, fiddling expenses led to the enterprise unnecessary expenses, but also can be a positive assessment of the staff of the company, to speak.

source : http://www.joint-tracking.com/newsInfo-410-13.html

https://www.novatel.com/focus-pages/what-are-gps-systems-used-for/

Click to access WG-IV-8-5.pdf

RUNWAY QUEUES

Everyone experience long lines at airports: at the check-in counter, the departure gate, and in boarding a booked flight, but even after we are already buckled in our seats, the waiting may continue — when a plane leaves the gate, the queus continue for the airplane before departure and  after our queues theory class, I wonder if the theory can be apply to the runway queues.

After searching I found about a queuing model developed by MIT that predicts how long a plane will wait before takeoff, given weather conditions, runway traffic, and incoming and outgoing flight schedules. The model may help air traffic controllers direct departures more efficiently, minimizing runway congestion. For example, if a controller knows that a plane is unlikely to take off for half an hour, he may choose to keep the plane at the gate to avoid contributing to runway backups.

Queuing theory include several characteristics like arrival pattern of customers, service patter of servers, queue discipline, system capacity, number of service channels and number of service stages.

The conclusion of the class was that queus grow due to variability and not disappear due to utilization, analyzing the runway queues we can see that almost all characteristics can be control. For example, arrival pattern of customers, in this case airplanes can be control when are they supposed to depart, the queue discipline its also control, the number of service channels it’s the only characteristic that cannot be modified in a short period, the departure runway are usually one or two for all the planes, and they have to manage to organize all the departure and landing towards the airport runway capacity.

Although, the queuing theory can be applied to this case, in my opinion this queue is much more complex not only the departure but the air traffic queues, there have been many accidents because of human error in the control towers and one error can cause possible deaths. Even though it would be interesting to know how exactly they manage such complex air traffic and queues control of the airports…

 

Maybe we can have visit the airport control tower? 😛

 

MIT Model –> http://www.mit.edu/~hamsa/pubs/SimaiakisBalakrishnan_TS2014.pdf

 

Wine logistics and transportation

Have you ever thought in the relation between the wine sector and the logistics?. Let me show you how the wine industry and logistics are intimately related. The transport of wine is part of the supply chain that includes: the vineyard, distribution, storage and transport. The evolution in wine transportation methods is generating that more longer and international routes can be made.

Like most of the cases related to the transport of food, the transport of wine needs to fulfill a series of characteristics. In particular, this liquid is sensitive to changes in temperature. The heat is a factor that especially worries all the participants in the logistics chain. The quality of the wine can be seriously affected if the proper temperature is not maintained, especially when long trips are made. In general, the transport of this merchandise is done with trucks that allow the control of the temperature.

On the other hand, packaged wine acquires another peculiarity: the danger of breakage. In general, this product is usually bottled in glass containers, although there are other possibilities such as plastic, that reduces the risk of breakage. To avoid this problem, numerous containers have been developed in order to solve this risk factor. Some of the proposed solutions are:

• Development of bottle containers with mounting systems and screw clamping. In this way, the container can be set.
• Filling of the gaps that occur between the pallets. It is intended to avoid movement in the goods and inclinations that may occur in transport.
• Installation of modular roller systems to move the loads. Sliding platforms are generated that facilitate the loading and unloading of merchandise.
• Use of adapted boxes, with special reinforcements and air cameras between bottles to prevent breakage.

Stock exchange

Have you considered investing in the stock market, but don’t even know where to start? Are you interested in the stock market, but do you think it’s complicated and inaccessible?

First of all, it should be noted that the income of the Stock Exchange is generated mainly in two ways: by buying shares in a company and selling them when their price rises (which we call capital gains), or through dividends, which are the profits that companies distribute among their shareholders.

Secondly, although in the long term the stock market may be a very profitable investment, it must be well known and operated with criteria; we must not forget that it is an investment in equities, either upwards or downwards. It is not possible to know in advance the profitability of a share, so it is advisable to invest only the amount that we will not need in the short term, and that you set your limits. It may happen that, when you sell, you get a lower price for your shares than you paid for them.

Finally, it should be borne in mind that the profits obtained on the stock exchange are taxable. If you keep your investment for more than one year, the profit will not be subject to withholding and will be recorded at 21%. If, on the other hand, these profits have been generated in less than a year, they will be added to the income from work and will be taxed at the corresponding rate. In addition, after the first 1,500 euros, dividends will also be taxed at 21%. This taxation is for the Common Territory, since the Haciendas Forales have another percentage of taxation.

AMAZON DASH BUTTON – KANBAN METHOD IN YOUR HOME

Amazon has created a new way to replenish your home products, now you don’t need to go to the supermarket and buy them, you just have to press a button located near to the product you want to replenish and then it is directly bought by Amazon Prim and delivered in your home 24 hours later.

This button is associated with a Prime product from the Amazon catalog and is connected to home Wi-Fi, so that when you press it, a purchase of that product is automatically generated, which you can have the next day in your house thanks to the Amazon Prime one day delivery.

For more information you can take a look to the web page: 

https://www.amazon.com/ddb/learn-more

Below you can see the promo video of Spain:

 

Crazy processing machine| Hydroponics Factory

While I was watching videos on YouTube, I saw a wonderful video about hydroponics factory. I really enjoyed watching it. It’s about hydroponic greenhouse farm specializing in the farming of an exotic vegetable variety. Plants are grown till they are ready to be picked. Production lasts on average between 8-9 months. During that time, the vegetables are consistently being produced. When ripe, they are picked and sorted by machine and hand, and then packaged in different boxes and containers. Once packaged, the product may be held in a refrigerated area or shipped immediately.

The packaging and shipments were carried out manually at the customer location, reporting had been manual too. With a great dependence on excel. The manager of this factory decided to do two things first he used a software solution that tracked the packing of produce as well as the shipments.

This software solution was a barcode-based and utilized to track the produce throughout the sorting, packing, storing & shipping processes. A mobile-based component manages field data activities. And also, for the payment management. This makes it easier for them to isolate dues as well as tracking of invoices. This software helps the customer to achieve streamlining and efficiency in operations.

In addition to, they used a fully automated Hydroponics system which was a smart machine for the whole system this was a really crazy innovation technology of plants growth till ready to be picked, and shipment at the same time they offer a good condition for this plant. these machines do the whole process without the need for employees help. By using these machines, they minimize the labor cost, also they have more production now than before. Thanks for the technology its really change the world.

I want to share the video with you, its 12 minutes but it’s worth watching.

Trying to find sense to the queues

This week has been San Jordi and in Barcelona the celebration of “the day of the book” brought together many people with the intention of buying roses and books to give away, and at the same time to meet many writers. It caught my attention to see that in front of the booths of some writers there were hardly any people to sign a book and, instead, in front of others there were long queues. The reason was clear, the long lines were in front of the most popular authors currently .The waiting time for these queues was more than one hour; but people endured them because the weather was good, the atmosphere was pleasant and they were distracted by seeing what was going on around them.

For me queuing is an ordeal because I consider it a waste of time. But queuing is part of our daily life. For this reason I consider that the management that a company makes its queues is an important factor to determine the satisfaction that the client has of that company. It’s about winning customers, not losing them. The changes in the structure of the queues that allow the customer to perceive that time passes faster, will undoubtedly favor a company to obtain more customers. With the implementation of basic and elementary actions, the queues can be reduced.

An elementary action consists in the placement of counters that must be strategic and proportional to the type of trade and the service it offers. Another key that speeds up the waiting time is to organize the queue in a single row where customers are placed in order of arrival to it and when the turn comes they will go to the box that is available (this system gives the user the feeling of which the tail progresses quickly). It is also interesting to implement a shift management system based on the service that is to be received and which causes employees to be more operational. It is also interesting to use devices to keep customers informed of the waiting time or divide it into different phases that keep them entertained. Another action that works in many places is the previous appointment, which allows distributing the waiting times. But there is no doubt that distractions are keys while queuing up. In order to do this, establishing an online merchandising along the queue, is the most effective way to distract the customer, while increasing sales: shelves with products labeled in large numbers, video screens … The waiting lines will be places of information and entertainment for customers.

As we have just seen, the process can be streamline, reduce times and costs, and increase profits. As the saying goes “time is money” because it is an increasingly valuable resource. Hence the need to effectively manage the queuing and waiting system.

I’m sure many of you will feel identified with this video.

Logistics inside tourism

Have you ever think about how the logistics affect the tourism sector and vice versa? As we all know since february thanks to this subject, all the sectors and things in this world are related with logistics, in this post I pretend to explain on which way the logistics and the tourism are related.

The logistic activities in the tourism companies contribute to the improvement in the experience and satisfaction of customers, workers, businessmen, suppliers and community, where tourism activity is developed, constituting an effective business management tool, adding value to tourism.

The logistics discipline in tourism aims to support the main activities of the sector. In the case of tourism companies, it is about providing services that complement the main activities such as a hotel, whose essential function is to host tourists; a restaurant, whose basic function is to produce food and serve them; a travel agency, provide tourism packages and excursions to attractive places and transport, among other types of companies.

This industry presents the characteristic of being highly sensitive to various variables: it is dependent on the economic, social situation, health crises and natural disasters. Therefore, each activity must be planned in advance, then once it is in development, it is difficult to solve a problem that could be detected in advance.

The relationship between tourism and logistics is basically focused on provisioning, supply and provision activities, activities that are reflected in the transportation of passengers, food, accommodation and material support to tourism programs, being fundamental to consider them when planning and organize a tourist activity or event. The elements of logistics can be organized into a single system adapted to each event, allowing the order and supply of consumers, products and facilities, seeking to act in favor of the environment, communication and its needs. Tourism activity has three well-defined phases: a beginning, a development and an end. Each of these phases has its particularities, where logistics intervenes in each case in particular.

Both logistics and tourism are based on the same premise: the generation of promises materialized in customer satisfaction, where the service must be at the right time, in the right place and in the right quality.

The development of tourism involves understanding and relating both disciplines by the tourist entrepreneur. The deep knowledge of each one of the logistic processes in search of its perfection, culminates in the organizational strategy and in the consequent competitive advantage.

Kane is Able, Inc. Exceptional Logistics.

Logistics is the process that ensures that goods or services are available where and when they are needed in good condition and at competitive prices. This post is about Kane, a company who provides third-party logistics services in the United States. It was founded in 1930 and in this is how it helped a global wine brand, to reduce its costs and its product damage.

Kane has grown from humble origins. Edward Kane founded the company during the Great Depression. He traded his car for a used truck to provide local cartage to shippers in the valley regions of Northeast Pennsylvania. Kane has grown organically realizing 2005 revenues of $108 million from a workforce of 1,000 associates. Kane’s quality focus and owner-driven culture make them a good choice for shippers seeking a logistics partner that combines the flexibility and personalized service of a smaller provider with the information systems and capabilities of larger logistics firms. (Armstrong, 2006)

A global wine producer was experiencing high damage rates due to its use of multiple partners for warehousing, packaging and transportation.  The company decided to integrate these services with a single company distribution, Kane. The company now manages all distribution services, as well as administration of required tax payments in each state in the distribution area. That solution helped them to reduce transportation costs by a lot and of course, the damage rates. From this small case, we understand how important distribution is, and how a company can fix important costs with a good logistics plan.

http://www.3plogistics.com/3pl-case-studies/kane-is-able/

Delivery to any place, at any time

Quite often I do online shopping but one thing that annoys me a lot in a home delivering system in Valencia is the absence of telephone notifications. In all the countries where I lived before, couriers always called in advance to confirm the time when you stay at home in order not to waste his own time and a client’s but in Spain, it seems like the couriers expect people to stay home the whole day just waiting for them. I am sorry but it is a bit ponderous topic J So the other day on the Internet I stumbled upon this device and thought that it would facilitate my life significantly.

Consumers want to have an option of receiving their deliver at any time and to any destination. Nowadays customers have an increasing number of service options, many of which are tied to new technologies.

Automated closets for receiving orders simplify the process of picking the parcel and provides a buyer with an opportunity to do it 24/7. For example, DHL invented a special automated postal station in Germany. This convenient solution is now available in more than 2,000 locations throughout the country.

This innovative concept with the postamates has reached a more personalized level, and now every buyer can have such a box at home. Located next to the buyer’s house, the postmat is convenient for delivery and parcel picking.

One of the latest innovation is the delivery of parcels in the trunk of a car. Using the mobile application, a courier gets the exact location of the car along with the access code to the buyer’s trunk. CarDrops.sg already offers this service in Singapore, DHL, Amazon, as well as Audi and Volvo have launched pilot projects to deliver orders to the trunk of a car in Germany and Sweden, respectively. In addition, individual orders (in particular, heavy goods) can be delivered directly to the client’s house or garage. This requires installing the Internet of Things application, which gives access to the opening of locks and doors.

Animal Transportation

When you already visited the Bioparc in Valencia, I am pretty sure that you will have asked yourself how these animals came into the zoo. Especially because the theme of the Parc is Africa you maybe had thoughts like “did they had catch them in the African wildlife?” and “did these animals like giraffes and lions come to Valencia by plane?”.

The answers to these questions seem to be difficult and so is the animals’ transport. There are many different ways of animal transportation, but in every case the planning starts already several months before, with a lot of paper work. Besides, the animals will get a health check-up, so no diseases will be carried into the destination country. A month before the transport, a responsible person from the destination zoo will visit the animal in their home place, to get an insight into the animals current living situation. The truth is that almost all animals are exchanges from other zoos or parks. Catching animals in the wild is nowadays difficult and almost impossible because of animal protection guidelines. Thus, giraffes for example will be born in a zoo and transferred to another zoo or park. This is due to the regulation of the European Union, which limits the number of inspection posts for animals to airports only. This means that the animal size is limited to the maximal size that can carried by plane.

As mentioned before, there are many ways of animal transportation. Starting from the decision regarding a transportation via air, sea or land, about the loading and offloading possibilities and ending with decisions concerning the best season for the transportation.

But no matter in which way the transfer will be performed, the whole time the animal’s health & stress level will be checked and can result in a cancellation of the undertaking.

http://www.animaltransportationassociation.org/resources/Documents/2017%20conference/Martelli_Paolo_Zoo%20Animlas%20Transport.pdf

Taking the example of an elephant transfer, the moving starts several weeks before, with a training for the elephant to go into the crate. On the transportation day, once the elephant is inside the crate, it is lifted a few inches off the ground and paused to see how the elephant reacts.

The crate is placed on the flatbed of a semitruck and cameras are placed in the crate behind the elephant to control its reactions. During the transfer, several stops are planned to constantly check the elephant’s health.

At the destination, a crane or a forklift is used to remove the crate from the truck.

https://www.dailynews.com/2017/09/22/got-an-elephant-you-need-to-move-heres-how-the-la-zoo-and-others-safely-transport-large-animals/

Elephant transport in the past:

Elephant Transport nowadays:

 

The way animals will be transferred differs from one animal species to another.

So, for example, dolphins are transported like this:

The little shrimp’s journey

If you visit the North Sea coast in northern Germany you can enjoy a local specialty which is called “Krabbenbrot”. Basically it is a “Schwarzbrot” (a pretty dark kind of whole wheat bread), smeared with butter and topped with a heaping pile of small “Nordseekrabben” or brown shrimp, as they are called in English, native to the North Sea. Sometimes it is also topped with a fried egg and looks something like this:

Actually you can also enjoy the delicious shrimps in all kinds other of ways…the northern Germans sure love their shrimp:

Shrimps on toast:

Shrimp Salad:

Shrimp soup:

Mmmmmh tasty

Since those tiny shrimps live in the North Sea you might think the distance they traveled from the catch to your “Krabbenbrot” was probably pretty short…well in many cases this assumption is sadly wrong.

In order to be devoured by you, the shrimp had to travel from the place they were caught in Germany (which is where you want to eat them) through Europe, continued their odyssey by crossing the Mediterranean Sea just to end up in Northern Africa, in Morocco to be precise . Here they are peeled because it is way cheaper than it would be in Germany. Once this is completed they start to get going again and make the whole trip again, just in the opposite direction. In the end the little shrimps traveled 6000 km!! While this certainly requires a perfectly planned and executed logistics and transportation system it is also a nightmare that is unsustainable. First, the “fresh” shrimps aren’t nearly as fresh as you would expect them to be, second the pollution and fuel consumption is horrendous. Still, apparently it is more lucrative this way then to pay a little more to some people in Germany to do it. (https://www.abendblatt.de/region/schleswig-holstein/article206301807/Die-lange-Reise-der-Krabben-nach-Marokko-und-zurueck.html)

Luckily, this trend may be about to change so I can enjoy my “Krabbenbrot” again with a clean conscience.  (https://www.n-tv.de/wirtschaft/Ostfriesland-will-wieder-selbst-Krabben-pulen-article20317438.html)

The 10 steps to organize a great event.

In recent times the major sporting events, whether it be Champions League final, Marathons, Olympics, etc. are based on the following points:

1.  Ideate it, see what you want to do and where you want to go.
2. Budget it, calculate how much it will cost us to create the event.
3. Communicate it, this refers to communication to government entities.
4. Marketing campaign to make it known, diffusion of the event to guarantee the maximum assistance stipulated.
5. Attracting clients, it consists of attracting both village and private financing to carry out the event.
6. Management of involved parties, to make a guide of the companies that will be able to work in the realization of the event.
7. Design and programming of the event, create the event schedule. Both the assembly planning and the duration of the event itself.
8. Set up of the event, work in the venue where the event will take place.
9. Planning of the event and possible problems/incidences, here we are on security issues, etc.
10. Dissemination of success, show how successful the event has been and try to spread the word that it will be repeated.

 

In this video he shows us the organization of protocol events.

These points can also be extrapolated to any event such as a party with friends to the World Cup football final.

Easy order in McDonald’s

Usually, when someone thinks about going to McDonald’s, it has a clear idea on its mind:

Arrive to the restaurant and make a queue until its your turn and you ask for your order. Then, you have to wait all the time that they are preparing your order (if they dont have the product ready, you will have to wait a bit more). When the order is ready, the cashier will tell you the total amount, you will pay and then try to find a table with your food tray (that probably would be heavy with the food and drinks).

What about changing the process?

It is way better to arrive there, decide what you want, ask automatically to a machine and pay at the same moment with your creadit card. Then, with a number that the machine gives you, you can go easily to find a table and wait comfortably seeing in which position of the queue is your order waiting to be prepared. Later, when it is complete, your number will appear in green and you can go to pick it up without doing any queue.

This way the way McDonald’s change their whole structure and improve the customer’s experience, by reducing the queues and making it easier for customers to wait more comfortably while their product is being prepared, rather than standing in line. Also, they offer the possibility to check the approximate time that it will take to be ready. Moreover, it is not only possible to pay with the credit card, because the customer could pay with cash when it goes to pick the order up.

This is a simple, but effective, example of who could a business improve the customer experience by changing the queue system.

Luggage Journey

Have you ever had a check-in bag with a long-haul flight?
You know exactly where you have to go to the airport, so have you ever asked how our items of luggage travel?

In this blog, I would like to share with you about the logistic system which is using in Dubai in order to serve a million of million passengers every day.

Dubai international airport its position as world’s number 1 international airport for the fourth consecutive year with annual traffic of 88.2 million passengers in 2017. Traffic is projected to reach 90.3 million in 2018 according to initial forecast (Source: Dubai airport report). Besides that, the gateway between the East and the West such as from Asia to Europe and main gate between the Middle East and Africa, Dubai is home to one of the fastest growing cargo hubs in the world. And the last thing, Dubai International Airport is the world’s number one airport in terms of number of A380 which is the biggest plane up to now with a capacity of 868 passengers. I flew with A380 from Dubai to Germany, it actually so tremendous with several different ways to access the aircraft.

I wonder how can they save the passenger’s time as short as possible? and of course, they have to keep it safe. There are the ways they manage the handle bad in a million of million passengers.

• The 1st step: Check-in
  A passenger needs to check in with your personal information on the airline desk, a tag will be stuck on each bag.
• The 2nd step: Security check
  Each suitcase will be scanned to through the common check-in system for certain all stuff inside is safe and to transfer it separately by flights. It has to make sure that every package sends to the right flight.
• The 3rd step: Luggage traffic
  On this track, luggage goes through an inter-terminal transfer system which is under the ground without interruption.
  Individually pack carries by each tilt tray sorter.
  The speed can be reached for each tray is 7,5 meter per one second.
  A number of packages are 15,000 items per hours. Thus, approximate 80 million bags per day. That amount in Dubai is more than 1,400 times in comparison with Changi which is Singapore International airport, it can prepare for 70,000 bags/day.
• The 4th step: Storage
  After 3 mentioned steps, luggage arranges in containers to delivery to the flight. They have an area under the passenger’s seat. Right after the flight landing, it’ll reclaim to transfer system to send back to passengers on the track.

Siemens is a provider of logistics in Dubai international airport for more than 10 years up to 2018. They have state of the art solution which adapts for specific needs.

I found out a video clip for the future proofing luggage logistic, most of the step is control by machines or robots in order to reduce labor work for workers. It’s pretty fast, convenient and safe your the check-in bags. Please have a look at this if you are interested in.

The fact that I’ve never have thought about the whole system with my check-in bags until today. For sure, next time in the airport I will try to get as much as information or material I can to understand more about the logistic system.

Inventory Control with the RFID System

One of the goals of inventory management is to make the processes smarter. Despite the fact that controlling the inventory via barcodes was a revolution, it has major disadvantages.

• Products can only be scanned one after another and a short distance to the reader is necessary.

One option to solve this negative side of barcodes is the RFID (Radio-frequency Identification) system. The RFID system is a passive system since the products will be checked automatically by a device, so no employee must scan it by hand.

For this system, products (or boxes/pallets) are labelled with a chip. These chips contain a microchip (that stores and processes information) and a transmitter (for transmitting and receiving signals), which will be activated by a RFID-reader. The information will be transmitted via radio waves, which makes the communication between the chip and the reader over a defined distance possible.

Compared to the distance which is possible for reading a barcode (~4,5 meter), the RFID system is able to exchange the information over a distance of ~ 90 meter.

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Technology-Article.asp?ArtNum=60

What is RFID?

The RFID system didn´t gain its popularity in the logistic and transportation sector without reason and has important aspects which should be taken into account:

• The RFID chips can be read quickly (typically in under 100 milliseconds).
• A large number of products can be read at once.
• The system updates the containing information steadily and storing a huge amount of information is possible.

Port Logistics

Ports could be regarded as a vital economic hub for a city and thus its country. Without ports the international trade, import and export, would not be achievable. While also planes can be used to transport goods across long distances and the ocean, it is way more expensive than ships and additionally, ships are able to carry bigger as well as more cargo. This makes them an efficient means of transport albeit not timewise.

The sheer amount of goods that enters and exits ports on a daily basis in enormous and demands a highly effective and complex logistics system. First, the arrival and the departure of ships have to be organized and planned so that no “traffic jams” and accidents occur. For this aspect ship ports are not so different from airports. Second, the ships have to be loaded and unloaded with heavy and big containers that ask for a variety of transportation vehicles, which also make a large number of highly skilled, licensed operators necessary. Most notably among those vehicles are the big container cranes (figure 1) that move along the wharf on rails, parallel to the docking site for the ships. They are the heart for moving the big containers from the port area to the ship’s cargo area.

Figure 1 – Container Crane

It is of course necessary to load the right containers onto the correct ship which asks for a highly sophisticated and, ideally, digital logistics system (http://www.hafen-wismar.de/de/seehafen_wismar/digitalisierung) which also has to take the import and export regulations into account. Therefore, customs and border control (figure 2) are also implemented in the complete logistics process of ports.

Ports are also part of a multimodal transport system since the goods that leave or enter the port have to be further carried by other means of transport including trains or trucks.

Here again, it is crucial to make sure that the cargo is loaded onto the correct truck or train in order for it to reach its desired destination.

(https://www.hafen-hamburg.de/de/news/von-der-fabrik-aufs-spielfeld-die-reise-eines-fussballs—31322)

All these aspects make ports an extremely busy place for logistics and therefore also a big challenge.

The Decathlon queuing system

I have been working for Decathlon in various leadership ranks for two years so I have enough experience to speak first-hand on this subject. In this post I will talk about the queuing system currently developed by the company as well as future plans. Fact that I will link to future publications.

Currently the premise on which the customer service is based is the complete advice and full availability so that from the moment the customer enters the store until the moment he makes the purchase.

To do this, from the moment you start working for the company, you undergo training that orients you towards the objective of being able to provide personalized attention. This is complemented by a large staff that is modified by the demand. The general managers of each department must make a forecast of the number of clients that can attend each period of time based on schedules or periods associated with high demand such as back to school. And based on these studies will have the necessary staff to meet all the needs of customers

The attention of the staff is complemented by computer systems that provide all the information about any product both in the store and in the catalogue in an easy and intuitive way, without the need for the intervention of the store staff. In addition, all the staff have smartphones that collect a whole series of elements that provide useful information to satisfy the customer’s needs. Through the use of smartphones the staff can access the status of a certain product in the store and even place orders in case of absence of the order requested by the customer. In addition, it provides a useful tool for the client since with the use of the smartphone we can show him opinions concerning the product of his interest and thus help him to obtain a better opinion and help him in his decision making.

Given the availability of space, most products cannot be displayed in the store so that only sizes and samples are displayed. And in case the customer wants to have any product, all he has to do is go to the computer points or to the store staff. They can make the arrangements to carry out the process of sending the product either to the customer’s home or for collection in store in a matter of minutes.

In short, Decathlon’s queuing and customer service system aims to provide fast and efficient customer access to your product and all relevant information. In addition, it facilitates the process of sending products in case of absence in store thanks to the new computer systems available in store and that greatly facilitate all the processes.

Cycle Inventory in Supply Chain Management

As we were studying logistics and supply chain, something occurred to me: why couldn’t we simply order a lot so that we have enough inventory for a long period of time? Otherwise, why couldn’t we order the exact quantity to match the customer demand? Well, reading through logistics article, I found my answer! A company cannot afford to order a huge quantity of product as the holding costs (cost of keeping the product in the company inventory) will be extremely high. At the same time, a company cannot afford to have low or no inventory as the demand can have a high variability and a lack of storage can lead to loss of sales and loss of customers.

Inventory depends on several things:

–      Demand(which has a certain degree of uncertainty)

–      Leadtime(which is the gap between when an order is placed and when the merchandise actually arrives)

–      Holding costs (cost of keeping the inventory in house)

–      Order costs(fixed costs incurred each time an order is placed)

–      Discounts (depending on the quantity purchased, the supplier can offer discounts which need to be taken into account)

–      Product price

The term Cycle Inventoryis used to define the average inventory in a supply chain due to either production or purchases in lot sizes that are larger than those demanded by the customer. It follows the following formula:

A lot size (or batch size): Q: is the quantity that a stage of supply chain either produces or purchases at a specific time.

A typical example of lot size is shown with this graph: Q (lot size) is the quantity order at a time t. In this case, the demand is kept constant, which mean that we forget about the variability of demand. If we want to take the variability of demand into account, a company can add a “safety inventory”:

In order for the company to understand which quantity they can order so that they can minimize the total costs, several models exist. One of which is the EOQ: Economic Order Quantity, which is the optimal lot size. This quantity can be found using this formula:

With: D: Demand; S: Setup Costs; h: Holding Costs; C: Cost per unit of product

There are many other models used to calculate the quantity required in order to minimize the total cost, or maximize the efficiency such as: Production Lot Sizing, Lot Sizing with capacity constraint, Lot Sizing with multiple products or customers,…

 

I hope that you now understand a little bit better the key concepts of Cycle Inventory. If you want to learn more about this, you can read through Chopra’s book (which is part of our class material): Supply Chain Management: Strategy, Planning and Operation.

Queuing management system in banks

In our last class, we were talking about queues system, Queues or waiting lines is a general phenomenon in everyday life, queues are usually seen at post offices, bus stops, hospitals, bank.

In the banking sector or any business sector the managers trying to improve the customer satisfaction by offering the better service. Every customer waits to be served according to the length of the queue.

In the retail banking industry, queuing remains one of the most common reasons for customer disgust. Despite technological advances such as online and mobile banking, customers still complain about their bank. In general, the bank estimates it serves about 150 customers per day, customers are served in the order they arrive at the bank, the time difference between serving customers. Managing long queues during peak business hours has always been a huge problem for banks, it’s a big alarm sign for banks and also for the customers, the 24-hr ATM banking facility is limited in the range of services bank customers can avail of.

Queuing management systems are intelligently designed to meet the customer banking needs. Queue system offers a wide range of applications from a single line queue system to multiple lines queuing systems and allow the bank to cater wide banking services.  customer enter the virtual queue line the moment they take a ticket using a self-service kiosk, once their ticket number reaches the teller, the customer is intimated using digital signage solutions allowing them to approach the specific counter. This advanced queuing system frees customer from waiting in long queues and creates a much pleasant and favorable environment whereby the user/customer can indulge in impulse buying.

when I was working in a bank I heard a lot of customers complaints about the queuing lines, they tried to solve this problem:

• by Added cash withdrawal commission if the customer wants to withdraw cash, to encourage the customers using ATM machines to reduce the number of customers in queues waiting for the services, also the customer mobile applications enables the customers to use most of the online services.
• In addition open the branches in the weekend, about 5 hours in a day but in my opinion,  it wasn’t a good solution especially for the employees because they need a rest in the weekend not to work too much, in addition to that they didn’t serve all type of services in that day so it’s not a perfect solution to minimize the number of customers in queues.  hence, I want to add some comparison between Spanish banks especially Valencia and Palestine banks from my previous experience and point of view that related directly to the queuing system.

	Palestine banks	Spanish banks
Working hours	One shift from 8:00 AM – 4:00 Pm	Two shifts morning and afternoon.
Branches	One branch- two branches maximum each city	More than 10 branches
ATM machines	Limited between 3 ATM machines in large countries	Widely spread
Online system	Limited service online	Almost all services can be done online even the loan
Branch services	Because there are limited to branches, they offer all services in one place	Every branch specializes in one-two services.
Using queuing management systems (by tickets)	Available	Available

All these factors are affected by the queueing system especially in banking sectors, such as limited hours, limited online services and limited spread of ATM machines.

source:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/crowd-control-management-solving-queue-problems-suha-abu-ghosh/http://queuemanagementsystems.com/solutions/banking/http://immchallenge.org/Pages/Resources/Bank-

Airport Queue management

Airport waiting time is stressful and can cause headache when you had 10-12 hours long flight and still have to stand in queues for another 1-2 hours. You have to stand in line for luggage checking, show travel document, immigration, go through scanning device and then to your terminal. I always have to experience this queue because I have to change 3 flights; Ahmadabad to Mumbai, Mumbai to Madrid, Madrid to Valencia.  If you have connected flight from different airport then again you have to stand in line for all this things again. The journey seems exhausted.

There is barcode system to estimate the rush of people at the choke point so that additional staff can be arranged and new queuing channels can be set. Though, this system does not give real time solution for the queues

The new BLIP systems can track the mobile phones and other devices and enable airports to track the movements of a traveler. It is installed Norwegian airports, Birmingham airport, Manchester airport, etc. BLIP system was founded in 2003, is a business intelligence company based near Aalborg, Denmark. In 2010, the queue prediction module was developed to provide airports and their passengers with accurate wait time information.

How BLIP works:

“Airports can use this information to understand things such as which parking spaces, airport entrances and services passengers use, how many people show up at airport processes, when they arrive and how long they wait,” says Christian Bugislaus Carstens, BLIP’s marketing manager. But what if personal data of the traveler reveled and misused. There is a question of security and protection of personal data. But “each mobile device has a unique MAC address which is assigned to the device during manufacturing and cannot be modified. MAC addresses do not link to any individual user data, thus personal information is not revealed, and no personal data is collected, disclosed or otherwise processed by BLIP Systems, in compliance with the EU directive about privacy” says Carstens.

Press Release: Norwegian airports boost #PaxEx with Danish sensor tech

https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/airports-smartphone-tracking-reduce-queuing-times-security-passengers-travellers-edinburgh-bristol-a8065846.html

Packaging containers for fresh seafood transportation

I really like seafood and since I live in Valencia, I can enjoy it anytime and can be totally sure that it is fresh since the city is based next to the seaside. However, back to my home country, we do not have that access to the diversity, quantity and quality of fresh fish. But it has always been a demand, so in recent years a lot of seafood restaurants have been opened and in order to attract clients they deliver fresh fish on a daily basis from all over the world. The logistics process is complicated, that is why I decided to concentrate only on a packaging feature.

Perishable products may be subjected to harsh environmental conditions, such as excessive temperature or humidity, on the way to their destination, thus, packing shipment is essential to keeping the seafood fresh. During shipping, insulation and refrigerants are key to preserving products. With the proper combination of insulation and refrigerants, the product can maintain within specific temperature ranges.

Insulation reduces the transfer of heat through packaging container walls. The most common insulation materials are expanded polystyrene (EPS) foam, rigid polyurethane foam, and reflective materials. Recommended refrigerants are gel coolants and dry ice to keep perishable products cold or frozen. Wet ice has many disadvantages, including weight and special water-resistant packaging requirements, but it may be used if properly prepared to prevent leakage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Vbs36wqyTI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxmkzrTMFTc

DELIVERY OF FOOD AT HOME

I am sure all of you have order food at home, such as pizza, kebab, chinese food, etc. When I have ordered it I always think how they plan the logistic for deliver the food in the corresponding address.

I propose two options:

1. A FIFO (First In First Out) system: They deliver the orders in the sequence in which they have been requested regardless of the location of the address.
2. A FIFO system taking into account the location of the address, that is to say, they deliver the orders in the sequence in which they were requested, but also, they have into account if the orders are close on the dealer’s route.

I think the second option is better for the reason that they can save gas money and deliver time, because the same delivery man can deliver several orders in the same journey. But it has a little problem, they must wait a bit between some requests in order to have deliveries in the same route.

Starbucks, Reorganize the supply chain

With a motive from my favourite iced hazelnut latte, I chose to wrote about the famous Starbucks Corporation. It is a very well-known American coffee company, founded in Seattle in 1971. The company operates 27,339 locations worldwide. Starbucks is distinguishing itself from other coffee-serving venues by taste, quality, and customer experience. It first became profitable in Seattle in the early 1980s and the first Starbucks location outside North America opened in Tokyo in 1996. Nowadays, overseas properties constitute almost the one-third of its stores.

Starbucks is pretty much a household name. But like many of the most successful worldwide brands, it has been through its periods of supply chain pain. During 2007 and 2008, Starbucks leadership began to have serious doubts about the company’s ability to supply its 16,700 outlets and therefore, sales were falling. At the same time though, supply chain costs rose by millions. When the supply chain executive team began investigating the rising costs and supply chain issues, they found that service was indeed falling short of expectations. Problems were included like slow deliveries and poor outsourcing decisions. Starbucks’ leadership had three main objectives in mind to achieve improved performance and supply chain cost reduction. These were to reorganize the supply chain and reduce the cost of serving. In order to meet these objectives, Starbucks divided all its supply chain functions into key groups, known as “plan” “make” and “deliver”. Next, the company set about terminating partnerships with all but the most effective. When the supply chain transformation program was completed, the company had made savings of more than $500 million.

What we can learn from this example, is that in order to make significant and sustainable cost improvements, substantial change must take place. Starbucks had to shake up its third party relationships and increase production capacity. None of the changes took place overnight. These issues were tackled in phases. When it comes to making supply chain cost reductions that stick, each and every avenue must be explored. The only way to see sustainable cost reductions, is to see the big picture from a new angle and be prepared to step outside of the comfort zone.

How to increase the enjoyment of working in a warehouse?

Bringing gamification to the warehouse workforce

Last week we talked in class about the job as forklift driver this triggered me to talk a bit more about jobs within warehouses. Working as a picker or forklift driver in a warehouse doesn’t seem to be the most inspiring job in the world. If you ask younger people on what do you want to become when you’re older less then 2% (I have no scientific research data, just an estimation) would answer, a warehouse picker or forklift driver.

However the job is still quiet important and with all package handling today we at the moment still needs these jobs to exist. The popularity of gamification on the workforce is taking a huge flight at the moment. Gamification is adding some game and fun elements to your core job to increase the entertainment and engagement of the employees and to become a great place to work for employers.

At the moment always every employee in the warehouse has a mobile phone which they use for their core business process, scanning boxes/products in the warehouse. The Enterprise resource planning tool they use in their job is getting more smart but some applications are also adding gamification in their process.  Gamification can increase motivation, engagement and creates a collaborative culture. It is based on video games in non-gaming situations like working in a warehouse. The warehouse is a perfect scenario for adding/using gamification elements. Warehouses can have anywhere from dozens to hundreds of employees, many of whom likely don’t interact on a regular basis. By using elements like challenges, badges, levels and leaderboards, gamification can help create a more interactive and compelling workplace environment.

Imagine a reward system based on the amount of packages you handle during the day individual or with your team? Image a pokemon go look a like app, so that during the day you can catch achievements which are located on your routes for example?
It would be a great idea to add a formal reward system in money or development courses for employees to get more inspired and to work harder during the days to increase productivity of the warehouse.

The following video provides a small introduction to gamification in our lives.

SaraMax Apparel Group after using Pick to light system

First, I would start to define the Order picking operations:

In the last class, we were talking about the picking order systems such as pick to light and voice picking I would like to mention the pick to light automotive system uses in most of the companies especially big companies.

The benefit of paperless is to increase the productivity, near 100% accuracy, labor optimization, real-time data available, and the elimination of redundant tasks (paper list, order checking), in addition to Rapid training hours, not weeks.

Pick to light system:

The pick to light system is simple, each pick location on a flow rack, shelving unit and pallet rack or other storing location system.  is mounted with a light display module to indicate the number of units to be picked whenever the product is needed from a location .as each item is picked, it can be confirmed as complete or marked as incomplete notifying the host server of a stock out condition. The order is automatically updated with what has been picked fully and what must be back ordered, the instant feedback from pick to light can drive real-time inventory systems and this information can be used to automatically drive stock replenishment to the picking area as minimum stock levels are reached.

The companies install pick to light system when they want an accurate and fast picking to be performed. I saw an excellent example of this system in Saramax Apparel Group they manufacture clothing garments. The company offers loungewear, sleepwear, infant layettes, undergarments, and kids apparel, they are a fully functioning warehouse, shipping, receiving, they use the production area to package and repackaging. They were facing many problems in the picking area and they use the Pick to light system; the new system provides Saramax with all the pick location required The solution has increased operational efficiency, added capacity, performance, visibility, and control, for example, the system shows how many pieces should the operator takes, and when the operators press the button then he/she finish picking. after picking.

Once the person is trained to use the system, usually in less than half an hour, individual picking productivity and accuracy is improved sustainability over that found in traditional paper-based operations.

source: 

http://www.saramax.com

http://sdi.systems/br/saramax

IKEA DORTMUND: Europe’s Warehouse

The world’s largest distribution centre of IKEA is located in the surroundings of Dortmund in Germany. It covers a total area of 135 hectares – larger than 200 football pitches. It houses approx. 800.000 palette spaces in fully automatic, high-bay warehouses. Products are shipped from here to all Ikea furniture shops in Europe.

IKEA wants to doble its revenues by 2020 and one key challenge builds the distribution. Accompanied by the success of e-commerce, customers gets more and more demanding referred to short-time delivery, ordering via any technical device and from any location. Now the distribution center in Dortmund fulfils up to 50.00 orders per day.

Link to PapeleriaDotCom Picking Class: Automated Warehouse

Please have a quick look at the following video, from 1:16 to 3:13 :

• The warehouse uses “normal” shelves with pallets on, in the hight of round about 30 meters. There is no carousel or any conveyor involved in the picking process.
• As you can see in the video, they work with fully automated fork lift trucks using the whole aisle that are connected with a server (which you can see at the end of the video).

Santa’s warehouse logistics: Things just got serious

A quick analysis of the Santa Claus’ huge warehouse

We all know Santa Claus, also known as Saint Nicholas, or Papá Noel here in Spain. He delivers presents (or coal) to all the kids around the world the night of the 24th of December. But… have any of you ever thought about the facilities he must have to storage all the presents he manufactures in his toy factories? Well, you don’t need to, as in a moment of boredom I have already done it!

It is well known that Santa lives in the Pole North, so we can assume he has there also the warehouse where he stores the presents. I tried to do some digging in the internet about land prices in the Pole North, but sadly it does not appear. Anyway, we can safely assume it must be really cheap the cost of the land over there, so the space in the warehouse is definitely not a problem.

As Santa only needs to deliver once a year his whole inventory, a LIFO storage system, with all the pallets on the floor would be the most suitable and easiest arrangement. No aisles needed neither, remember you are delivering all your storage at once, once a year, no need of picking in between. So just a big island of pallets on the floor. Because of the cheap prices of the land, automatization would significantly increase the costs due the high ammount of pallets Santa handles, and would suppose a incredible high investment he can easily avoid by just storing at floor level.

Santa’s warehouse arrangement. He likes keeping things simple.

But, how many pallets? Lets assume the mean number of present boxes per pallet is of 50 units. Just one level of pallets, to avoid crushment (in Pole North we have plenty of space anyway). Based on the global ammount of kids (0-15 years old), delivering a present per kid, it would be needed just around 45.7 million pallets. Taking into account the proportions of an europallet (Saint Nicholas is european after all), it is translated into a pallet island of 43.87 square kilometers. That is around one third of the city of Valencia, or 13 times Central Park.

Calculations for the pallets needed

This calculations only lead us to many more questions. How many elves (the Santa’s pickers) would he need for Christmas? What would be the holding costs? Which picking methods does he use? How many SKUs is he holding?

I think we should skip the Ford’s visit and go to the Santa’s warehouse.

World Hunger is a Logistics Issue

Once, I went to a restaurant called Flam’s, eating a traditional Alsatian cuisine: the Flammkuchen (it is REALLY good, I advise you to try it out sometimes… 😉 ). We picked a menu where we can have unlimited amount of this dish and the waiters kept bringing more food on the table, up to a point where we had to tell them to stop. But they were already done so they had to throw it away, and they do this every day. This made me think of the problems that we have with hunger and food waste in the world and what could be done to prevent this from happening. In the World, more than 795 million people do not have enough food to live a healthy life. This is around one out of nine person. This number affects mostly developing countries, where poor nutrition is the leading cause of death among children: each year 3.1 million children aged from 0 to 5 die from hunger in the world. The United Nations have been able to collect many statistics regarding world hunger and the potential solutions that could help to reduce this problem. But Hunger is not a food problem, it is a Logistics issue. (https://wfpusa.org/articles/tedups-why-hunger-logistics-problem/) The issue is to bring the appropriate food to the people who need it the most.

One third of the amount of food produced every year in the World is wasted, which is around 1.3 billion tonnes. If we could save only a third of that amount, that would be enough to feed the World. Logistics, which is the services, knowledge, and infrastructure that allow for the free movement of goods and people, has been recognized to be a key element in achieving sustainable food security, and thus a driver of competitiveness and economic development. Scientists have developed the term of agro-logistics, which can help, for example, to address the food security challenge: from “farm to fork” and all the stages in between.

It is believed that the biggest part of the waste is happening during the production stage, but the FAO (Food and Agricultural Organization) has found out that it was mainly happening during the consumption stage. Thanks to the advances in logistics and supply chain, a lot of progress has been done and food waste has been cut in the production stages. Studies have shown that the more complex a supply chain is, the more likely it is to have a huge waste. It is also due to the fact that poor storage can deteriorate the quality of the food and thus it has to be thrown away. This is why sustainable logistics is more than ever needed! Many governments have created a program designed to help developing countries to strengthen food security and reduce food losses. For example, the USA have helped to finance projects consisting of creating better storage facilities throughout the country, so that food could not rot. A proper storage facility can reduce waste up to 98%, which is phenomenal!

Gandhi: “The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed.”

If you want to learn more: http://blogs.worldbank.org/transport/feed-future-let-s-make-logistics-and-transport-sustainable😉

If you want you can also watch this Ted Talks about how logistics is at the roots of world hunger and how it could be solved:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXlMn3WGHkE

 

Why VeChain blockchain will disrupt the logistics process

Since probably the hype of bitcoin last year we all heard of the blockchain technology. However still the majority of people only see blockchain as an equivalent to bitcoin and a asset to invest in to earn money, but nothing is less true. Bitcoin is only one really limited application of blockchain technology and focusses only on financial transactions without any extra intelligence. Thankfully, blockchain technology has plenty more to offer and obviously will disrupt many industries, including logistics!

What is blockchain:
Blockchain is not bitcoin, blockchain is a way of working, the blockchain technology works as a decentralized database for handling divergent types of data. All applications we use eventually work on an information database, whether it is Whatsapp, online banking or Facebook, in the end they all rely on an information database which provides the correct data on the right time. However before the era of blockchain those were all centralized databases in the datacenters of for example Facebook and our financial institutions. Those centralized databases are a single point of failure and we all just have to trust that those institutions handles our data safe and correct, all the power is in the hands of the institutions. The blockchain is different it is decentralized over a worldwide network of computers in a peer-2-peer network and all data is separated all over the biggest network (blockchain) of the world. The most important part of this decentralized database is that every node in the network has a copy of the database and if someone adds, edits or deletes data the whole network has to agree on the fact that that person can adjust the data, which makes the system very trustful. It is just spreading the risk resulting in the fact that there is no single point of failure anymore in where cyber thiefs can hack. If you want a more comprehensive explanation of blockchain please view the following video.

Bitcoin was just the beginning
Bitcoin is only just a limited first generation financial decentralized database system which can handle only financial information. At the moment there are plenty of second/third generation blockchain initiatives which are way more intelligent databases and can handle way more extensive data, and one of the biggest supply chain management blockchain initiatives is VeChain.

What is VeChain?
VeChain is a logistic leading blockchain platform for luxury products and data. VeChain strives for a self-developed blockchain platform based on an ecosystem of transparency and distributed companies.

As mentioned above, VeChain develops a blockchain with mainly logistical purposes. The VeChain smart chip is one of these developments. The purpose of this chip is the authentication process of all kinds of products. In addition, the chip gives background information about the relevant product. But how does this work exactly? As an example we take a nice brand coat. For years, many brands have been copied worldwide. These products are often indistinguishable from the consumer. VeChain wants to put an end to this by means of the smart chip. The chip is processed in the product. When the product is scanned, the chip gives all information about the product. Consider the authenticity of the product but also the maker, the material, the country of origin and the production date. A complete digital profile of a product is created, as it were. As you can understand, this is a very big development in the field of product authentication. If VeChain succeeds in setting this up, this can be very interesting for the complete project.
All this chip data is handled on the fast, safe and reliable blockchain databases which makes it a future proof solution for efficient, effective handling of the product/logistics data.

The following video simply explains the VeChain products. If you are curious in the project and you want to invest in blockchain technology don’t hesistate to ask me!

 

Will the middle east be the future operations center of world logistics?

The relocation of the logistics operations centre by Nestlé highlights a couple of elements that demonstrate an upward trend today.

The first relates to the trend of large-scale operational centres towards relocation to the eastern parts of the country. In the case of Nestlé due to its globalization process and its proximity to raw materials, and the current growth trend of countries such as the United Arab Emirates.

The strategic position of countries such as the United Arab Emirates, thanks to their access to the Persian Gulf and their location midway between Asia and the West, makes them a very interesting option for the establishment of world logistics centres. This is complemented by the implementation of economic policies to attract this kind of centre by the government, which makes the Persian Gulf a very interesting option. In addition, maritime and airport infrastructures are being improved to facilitate transactions.

Another important element is related to the logistics centre per se as it is based on the latest technology and automation standards. Highlighting the trend towards computerisation of logistics processes.

This element is reflected in all types of industries. From the producers themselves to the distributors that are carrying out a process similar to Nestlé through the implementation of new digital systems ranging from picking to distribution.

And finally, the efficiency with which the process of transporting the equipment from one logistics centre to another must be highlighted. This titanic task has been carried out by Mohebi Logistic, a company focused on Middle East logistics… The task was completed quickly and efficiently without any delays or setbacks.

Nestlé Middle East relocates to new logistics hub

Fine Art Logistics

Three weeks ago I got back from a trip to Vienna where due to the weather conditions my friend and I had to spend a lot of time in museums. Belvedere is one of the most famous in Vienna with its incredible collection of Klimt works. Some of the paintings that were presented in the museum I had seen before in other cities. At that moment I started to wonder how the pieces of art are transported and what is behind that logistics process.

After a little research, I found a list of leaders who specialize in fine arts transportation. They all describe the process, as extremely complicated and delicate, that entails a lot of resources.

First of all, scientific pre-planning and program scheduling are needed as fine art pieces must be transported in special temperature and climate control vehicles equipped with security web-enabled cameras in humidity controlled storage facilities.

Secondly, only highly qualified and experienced art handlers can work with art pieces by following a certain packing and crating international fine art standards.

Thirdly, international transportation requires a lot of documentation work. At the beginning insurance should be issued and not every transportation company can be accredited. Then customs permission for temporary imports must be granted and at destination swift customs clearance must be performed.

Some of the links that visually demonstrate the process:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGZSL-_VOYU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yIOsLwWrWw

Picking area: The importance of designing the best order picking system

Trying to understand the case “Papeleria DotCom” I have asked myself many basic questions.   The problem we had to solve this week was about picking. Before demoralizing me trying to solve the problem, I learned the meaning of this term, and I want to write about this.

In the logistics, warehousing and distribution of merchandise services of a company, picking is the process of selecting and collecting material from the warehouse efficiently and effectively. In other words, it consists of collecting the goods from the warehouse (stored in different locations), which must be used to prepare orders and transport them to the area where the customer will pick them up.

Given the exigency of consumers, the activity of picking is essential, while the customer wants a fast service, without errors and that preserves the quality of the product. For the advantages offered by this system it is clear that the preparation of orders consumes up to 2/3 of the operating cost. Therefore, it is important to analyze the procedure followed in the storage, studying the reason why orders are delayed, see the shortest routes for operators, place the goods according to the frequency in which they are requested and adjust them according to the demand. Without a doubt, reducing the impact of picking can mean becoming a competitive company in the market.

The biggest impact is on the preparation of orders. For this it is convenient to optimize the collection flow of the products, in an orderly manner and with the help of the use of technology. This will result in lower costs, faster order delivery and greater customer satisfaction.

In order to reduce the movement of workers and make the best use of space some equipments can be implemented, like the vertical carousel. This equipment is usually made up of a load-bearing structure in which the entry and exit of the goods are automated thanks to an extractor and lifting mechanism. Furthermore, the implementation of the carousel vertical is recommended for homogeneous loads, high quantity of references, and high complexity orders and and the main disadvantage of this system is that it is expensive and it needs reliable information systems.

So, maybe, this is not the best equipment for the case “papeleria Dotcom”, although this system is widely used in the pharmaceutical and electrical components industry.

This video has helped me to understand the basic operation of this equipment:

Undoubtedly, the issue of picking is very interesting, because it allows companys to apply different strategies as well as technologies depending on the warehouse and types of products.

How does the biggest warehouse in China look?

As any children, when somebody mention “Alibaba”, I just know he is a brave hero with a magic lamp from the folktale Alibaba and the Forty Thieves. In the real world, another Alibaba which is a well-recognized name in China’s e-commerce space. In this blog, I would like to share with you the success of a business not only by the revenue but a smart warehouse also.

If Amazone bought a company which created picking robots, Alibaba invested into Chinese developer $14 million for robots. Besides that, $16 billion paid for automation strategy. Inside Alibaba, robots do 70% of the work. Each robot can carry up to 500 kilograms, delivery to every shelf in a warehouse. Its have special sensors to avoid colliding with each other and they can be summoned by using wifi. A 5-minute charge can power for 4-5 hours. (Source: Asian robotics review, published on April 2017)

Alibaba Group was founded in 1999 by 18 people led by Jack Ma who is in top 20 Billionaires all over the world in (analyst from Forbes published on 14/03/2018). Basically, Alibaba enables to transform the way they market, sell and operate. It provides the fundamental technology infrastructure and marketing reach to help merchants, brands and other businesses to leverage the power of the Internet to engage with their users and customers. Their businesses are comprised of core commerce, cloud computing, digital media and entertainment, innovation initiatives and others.

Albeit Alibaba was born 5 years after Amazone, in 2017, Amazon is up to 30% this while Alibaba’s stock has nearly doubled as both companies race to $500 billion in value in 2017 (Data from CNBC published 3:35 pm ET on Fri 1, Sep 2017). It indicates the gradually develop the business. Moreover, it’s located in China With 560 million Internet users spending 20 hours a week online, China is by far the largest Internet market in the world-twice the size of the U.S. market (A short comparison between Alibaba and Amazon)

These videos will show more about how robots work in Alibaba’s warehouse.In overall, I would say that for retailers in recently e-commercial, one the most important thing is a warehouse where keep most of the revenue for the business. There are should be privileged for every company wants to succeed with logistics.

Blockchain in Food Safety.

Recently, Bitcoin has brought to light blockchain technology, which offers great potential for food safety and verification in the food sector.

Simply put, blockchain technology is a way of storing and sharing information across a network of users in an open virtual space. Blockchain technology allows for users to look at all transactions simultaneously and in real-time. In food, for example, a retailer would know with whom his supplier has had dealings. Moreover, since transactions are not stored in any single location, it is almost impossible to hack the information.

For those who don’t know yet, here is a nice video where it is explained how blockchain works.

 

Some companies, such as Nestle, Unilever, and Dole, normally competitors, are coming together with Walmart to form a standard of using blockchain to ensure food safety. Your can read here the whole article.

Also, we could see here, explained by Frank Yiannas, Walmart’s Vice President of Food Safety, how this works:

 

This has obvious implications for food safety—when salmonella or other contaminants are discovered in an item, it would be simple to discover from where those items came and to which stores those items were sold, generating potential cost savings. But, as it is said in the video, traceability is not only the goal. The final goal is also to know how was this item produced.

Was it produced safely? Was it produced responsibly? Is it sustanaibley grown?

I would definitely spend few minutes to discover this while buying some products, would you?

 

FOOD LOGISTICS IN THE UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL OF BURGOS (SPAIN)

The food logistics in a hospital must be very rigorous because each patient has a different diet with different restrictions, intolerances and allergies. I am going to explain how the University Hospital of Burgos works.

On the ground floor of the building there are different rooms, each for a type of food such as meat, fish, vegetables, etc. so as not to mix them and cause problems due to allergies and intolerances. (See video, min. 1:12 to 1:40)

The meals are prepared in other room considering the diet of each patient supervised by a dietitian. Each meal is located into a cart which preserves temperature, both heat and cold. (See video, min. 2:52 to 3:15)

All the carts are sent to the corresponding floors of the hospital where the nurses can distribute the trays with the food to each patient. (See video, min. 3:15 to 3:44)

After the patients finish the meals, all the trays are in the carts again and are gone down to the ground floor again in order to clean them up. (See video, min. 3:44 to 4:34)

Video:

 

Intel, Cost Reduction Strategy

Intel Corporation, an American multinational corporation and technology company, is the world’s second largest and highest valued semiconductor chip makers. It’s also the world’s largest supplier of CPUs (Central Processing Units) for personal computers with about 90% market share. That 10% market share that the intel doesn’t owe, is extremely important to the pricing and therefore, the gross margin structure of the business. Intel supplies processors for computer system manufacturers such as Apple, Lenovo, HP, and Dell. Intel also manufactures motherboard chipsets, network interface controllers and integrated circuits, flash memory, graphics chips, embedded processors and other devices related to communications and computing. The reason I chose to write about this company, is because it was very interesting for me to see how a company of this size can focus and apply cost reduction actions in their supply chain and make them work.

For more than 45 years in the semiconductor business, Intel has always been at least one process node ahead. Node size reductions are generally a 1/3 of reduction from the linear dimension, resulting in approximately a 50% reduction in the area and therefore, a doubling of the units produced on the same cost. The company needed to make a lot of supply chain cost reductions after bringing its latest, low-cost chip to market. They had to reduce somehow, the supply chain costs for the chip, but they had only one area of leverage, the inventory. The chip had to work, so there were no service trade-offs that could be made. Intel had already whittled packaging down to a minimum and the chips’ distribution costs could not really be pared down any further. The only option was to try and reduce levels of inventory which were very high.

Intel decided to try what was considered an unlikely supply chain strategy: a true make-to-order scenario. The company began with a process of iteration, they gradually sought out and eliminated supply chain inefficiencies to reduce order cycle time. Through this incremental approach, to cycle time improvement, Intel eventually drove the order cycle time for the chip down from nine weeks to just two. As a result, the company achieved a supply chain cost reduction of more than $4 per unit.

REVERSE LOGISTIC IN H&M: HOW IT WORKS

Recently I’ve made an order in H&M, and thought about what to do with all cloths that I will not wear anymore, which are just stored and take up space in my closet. Today overconsumption is not just a threat to your personal budget, but the problem of an entire planet!

H&M is one of the few companies who uses reverse logistic for used cloths.

Reverse logistics is a strategy in supply chain management in which a company collects and reuses some part of their distributed good. Typically, a supply chain network creates a path for companies to reach consumers. However, in reverse logistics, companies create a new supply chain network that works backwards, and allows consumers to reach the company. Organizations that implement reverse logistics reduce their waste and environmental impact, are accessible to consumers, and improve overall corporate citizenship.

H&M accepts used clothing at all of their stores worldwide. The clothes can be any condition or brand, and H&M will use the clothing they’ve collected to create an all-recycled clothing line. This type of reverse logistics chain allows all types of consumers to get involved with the brand, even if they didn’t purchase their garment from H&M.

To understand how reverse logistics can add value, it is necessary to determine the two most important component of this process – marketing and logistics.

From the point of view of marketing effective reverse logistics works for the brand. Today, one tweet or post on social media could have huge positive or negative effects on a company. By being prepared and having already-established access points to consumers in the reverse logistics system, company will be able to keep consumers happy and let them feel that they do something good. Being an active, environmentally-friendly corporate citizen is also good for any brand and the planet.

In terms of logistics, returns are also extremely effective. Quickly delivered returned goods can be re-launched into the supply chain: either in their current state or after appropriate modification.

On the picture below you can see the reverse logistic process:

Nowadays, more and more companies launch reverse logistic, understanding the importance of the process. Since H&M launched garment collecting initiative in 2013, they have gathered more than 55,000 tonnes of garments to give them a new life – that’s more fabric than in 270 million t-shirts!

Sources: https://about.hm.com/en/sustainability/get-involved/recycle-your-clothes.html,

http://circulatenews.org/2016/06/why-corporations-will-have-to-invest-in-their-reverse-logistics/

Traffic light logistics: when you become the package.

While I was studying my industrial electronics and automatics engineer degree, I had to program a cross street traffic lights for a simulation. The task was not particularly difficult (I was just programming a couple of traffic lights for an intersection), but it made me realize how difficult must be to control not just one intersection, but all of them in a big city like Valencia (or worse, Madrid).

Just in the same way in a warehouse you have to take into account the holding costs, in a intersection of streets, if the red-green light periods of the traffic lights are too long,  retentions will be created, and if they are too short, only a few cars, the ones in first line, will cross, due to the delay in the reaction time of the drivers. So a proper lenght has to be found, and it depends on the traffic flux, which is also dependent on the area, hour and day, so a constant revision of the periods is needed.

By the way, we don’t have to forget the yellow light. Sometimes are not needed, if there is no “dilemma zone“, but when needed, if it is too short, some drivers will cross in red and it may cause accidents (although it also increases ticket revenue if you put a camera).

A propper traffic light system is not a joke, the Los Angeles synchronized whole-city-traffic light system “increases travel speeds by 16 percent and reduce travel time by 12 percent. And because of reduced idling time, the city says it will save 1 million metric tons of carbon from entering the atmosphere”.

In case you wanna know a bit more about how all this works, here there is a video of the Los Angeles Department of Transportation Automated Traffic Surveillance and Control Center.

Hope next time you see a traffic light, you look at it with different eyes.

Ryanair: a Low-Cost success story

 

During the couple days off that we had during the holidays, I went back to France to see my family. While looking at several options that I could choose from to go back home, many were way too expensive for my student budget: with usual airlines offering prices going from 250 euros and above, I could not imagine paying that amount of money! I thus decided to use Ryanair, which is one of the most well-known low-cost airlines in the world, and my wallet can now thank me for the few pennies I saved!

 

 

How do they do that? You ask (I ask myself that too… 😉 )

 

Well it’s easy, they became the best player in logistics in the airline industry. First of all, they managed to master inbound logistics. Indeed, they managed to take off and to land from smaller airports with lower landing fees. For example, in Brussels, the company mostly lands in Charleroi Airport rather than in Zaventem Airport (which is closer to the capital). This also helps the company to reduce their costs, and thus to offer cheaper flights.

Furthermore, they managed to create an efficient operation system. Indeed, through a fully automated system that enables customers to book their flight without the help of employees, the company managed to significantly reduce labor costs. They also managed to drastically reduce the costs by removing every unnecessary items that we could find on regular airlines: in person check in, food, drink, Wi-Fi, entertainment, luggage etc. Every added features will be paid by the customer.

Using outbound logistics, they realized that they did not need to rely on travel agency, as this would increase the price offered to clients because of the commissions that would have to be paid. The only way someone can buy a ticket from Ryanair is through their online platform. Ryanair also focuses on short turnaround times (TAT) (http://economics-files.pomona.edu/jlikens/seniorseminars/likens2013/reports/ryanair.pdf) : this means that every plane must be in the air most of the time, as when it is on land, the company loses money.

Ryanair has also been able to secure a strong partnership with its suppliers, such as Boeing. In March 2018, they had a fleet of 429 Boeing 737, which they bought in batches in order to reduce the costs. (https://www.airline-suppliers.com/tag/ryanair/)

 

Ryanair is thus a success story of the low-cost airline industry thanks to its performant strategy in inbound logistics, operations management and outbound logistics.

HOW DOES IKEA MANAGE ITS INVENTORY

In my last visit to Ikea I saw their unique packaging in the warehouse bins and reserve racks, all Ikea furniture’s are designed in pieces for the customers to assemble, these pieces are placed into convenient and efficient flat packages for low-cost transport because they take up less room in trucks and maximizing the number of products that can be shipped. Their unique packaging takes up less space in warehouses and allowing for more room to stock additional items for order fulfillment

Using IKEA’s proprietary inventory system, logistics managers know what is sold through point-of-sale (POS) data and how much inventory comes into the store through direct shipping and from distribution centers through warehouse management system data. From these data, they can forecast sales for the next couple of days and order in the suitable number of products to meet that demand. If the sales data doesn’t match the projected number of items that should have been sold that day, the logistics manager goes directly to the pallet and bin to manually count the product stock. inventory is let down to the lower slots at night ( forklifts and pallet jacks are not used during store hours for safety reasons).

Every Ikea store has their inside warehouse for securing stock, that the customers can find their products and items. Ikea wants as much self- service as possible it works to minimize the number of items in this bulk storage area. After finish selecting all the items and write down the number of items on a small paper they can go and browse where the furniture is.  every item in the store has a unique code, from this code the customer can easily locate their products in IKEA warehouse from the floor pallet location with racking and then purchased and taken home. in addition, they put recommendations on each shelves to help their customers putting their selectin items in the cart to save more space and to carry it easily.  additional products are stored in reserve racks above these locations.

 

In Furniture manufacturing companies when someone selects a piece of furniture to buy, the items are ordered, shipped from the manufacturer, moved from the delivery truck into storage in the warehouse, moved from the warehouse to customer’s vehicle or delivered by the furniture retailer to the customers home, every time the product is shipped, moved and loaded it costs money. Ikea saves costs in their policy the fewer times someone moves or touches the item, the fewer costs are associated.

.Source: https://www.tradegecko.com/blog/ikeas-inventory-management-strategy-ikea

Estonia as an example of technology leader

https://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/07/economist-explains-21

Based in the information that we can obtain from the first sight in Google, Estonia is sovereign state in Northern Europe which obtained the independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. After the independence Estonia was plunged into the most absolute chaos but in the recent years it has been considered as a reference in the economic atmosphere. And that´s because the develop of a successful high-tech economic system which is called e-estonia. And what is exactly e-estonia?

The story that makes the Estonia government the most tech developed and in consequence  the most technological country in the world starts with the first independent government of Estonia after Soviet Union who decided to base the growth of the country in the develop of an economy based in the technology. That government put their faith in the first stages of the internet and the future of the digital era. And they were right in that decision.

Now, let´s develop some policies that Estonia’s government had implemented across the years. In 2000 Estonia was the first country to declare the Internet as a human right and introduce a paperless system where the online signature has the same value as the traditional one. That simple gesture changed everything because it proved the innecesary of the paper use and allowed the use of digital signature for opens bank accounts, pay taxes and even vote in the elections. The easy process of doing the traditional bureaucracy allows Estonians to realize most of their dealing without the need of visit any institutions, simply they have just to use their ID card to doing most of the thing from wherever they want. For example, the process of set up a new company doesn´t take more than 20 minutes what makes Estonia as one of the most entrepreneurship countries in the world and from where companies as Skype was set up.

Other examples of successful policies of Estonia government is the develop of a system called x-Road which allows to share information between institutions. Cause everything is saved online and registered in each ID the Estonians can take their medical records with them wherever they go or share their educational experience with a simple click, saving them the complicated procedures that are so common in other countries.

Another element that makes Estonia so current is their concern of the online privacy and security. That concern comes from the first stages of the country but since in 2007 they suffered a cyberattack supposedly from the Russia government after the Tallinn government decided to remove a Second World War memorial, the fear to futures attacks has never stopped growing. That why the have implemented a blockchain system and they have created the first data embassy in Luxembourg to keep all their datas safe. That technology allows security member to develop new encrypted data and make the system as invulnerable as possible.

To sum up, Estonia has achieved several accomplishments that have changed absolutely the country and move their economy from the disaster to be an extreme of digital living. But can be that example be implemented in larger countries? And even more, Estonia has proved that they have a cultural background open to changes but are there cultural barriers in other countries that make harder to implement strategies such as Estonia has done?

 

Edible packaging: a new way to take care of our planet.

Most big drinks brands switched to plastic from glass bottles in the 90’s. The reason is simple; they are harder to break, lighter and cheaper.

According to data from the latest Cicloplast report, 2,151 kt of plastic waste or plastic scrap is generated annually in Spain. Of these, 34% are being recycled, 17% are being recovered for energy and 49% are being landfilled.

These figures reflect that Spain is one of the leading European countries in the recycling of plastic materials (only behind Norway, Sweden, Germany and Ireland). However, it is in the queue for energy recovery of waste (only ahead of Bulgaria and Greece).

What is happening with this 49% of the plastic waste that is being generated?

Why something that is being used 10 seconds would pollute the planet for hundrets of years?

That was the question that the founders of Ooho! did.

They created an edible packaging for water, in order to launch a competitive enough product to avoid the use of plastic bottles.

The edible container is like a flexible, transparent bubble. The technique used is similar to “spherification” – popularized by Ferran Adrià – to wrap liquids with a membrane made of brown algae and calcium chloride.

What are the characteristics of this product?

• 100% made of plants and seaweed
• Biodegradable in 4-6 weeks, just like a piece of fruit
• Edible. It can be flavoured and coloured.
• Fresh. Shelf life of a few days.
• Cheaper than plastic.

Also, they are now developing this technology for packaging oil, that is biodegradable but not edible, resistant and non-drip!

In my opinion, taking care of our planet and developing ecofriendly strategies is one of the main points of the development, so this is a great innovation in the field of packaging to make our world greener!

STADLER: Tram Oversea Delivery

I am currently working at STADLER, a Swiss train company with international production, locations and clients, in the After-Sales department. We are weekly sending spare parts to Germany, Israel, Norway, Spain, etc. However, what me made thinking the last month was the following media release:

“Stadler wins contract to manufacture 12 trams for the Metropolitan Train Project of Cochabamba, Bolivia”

“For the first time electric trams will be operating in Bolivia. The METELITSA type model will have a capacity of up to 200 passengers and will be in commercial service by 2020.”  

“The trams will be assembled in a European factory and, once verified, disassembled by modules and shipped to Cochabamba. The shipment of the tram modules is estimated to last one and a half month.”

The vehicle data is the following:

• Vehicle length: 33,5 m
• Vehicle width: 2,5 m
• Vehicle height: 3,6 m
• Number of sections: 3 sections

https://wwwstadlerrailcom-live-01e96f7.s3-eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/filer_public/57/43/574363fd-bc8f-41cb-ac29-f2f3142d4321/t0816_856e.pdf

HOW TO DELIVER A TRAM OVERSEA? SEARCH OF A SOLUTION:

So, I was thinking how do they realise to send a product whit that size, since the whole tram is assembled in European factories.  Since the media release did not mention in how many parts they will ship the product, we can assume that they will split the tram at least in its 3 sections (11×2,5×3,6m).

I was searching further information about containers which are extra-wide and can support heavy products and I found the following construction for the specialised ship container that fits the requirements:

Seacom – Roll Trailer 40 ft / 100 ton

https://www.forkliftcenter.com/forklifts/files/1080-5148SpecificationRT40100t-3122-s2c.pdf

Dimensions (approx.):

• Platform length: 12,4m
• Platform width: 2,59 m
• Capacity: max 100 tons

–> That was the only kind of container which are able to support a whole section of tram. High cube containers, which are completely closed and extra-high having one of the largest container specifications, could not fulfil the requirements of the width. Under the simplification of our requirements, STADLER would need at least 36 roll trailers in order to fulfil the oversee delivery.

MILK PACKAGING

Why 1L milk packages have square shape and 1,5 L milk packages have circular shape? The latter has only 0,5 liters more and the shape is different, which is the reason? But the shape is not the only difference, the square shape packages are made of paper-based material and the other ones of plastic material.

For the contrary, in the case of juices all are saved in paper square packages, independently if they have 1 or 1.5 L. Maybe the reason why all of them are in square shapes is because this way is cheaper and the material of this kind of packages are suitable for a good conservation of the juice.

But then we can ask ourselves, depending on the amount of milk, Does the method of preservation is different? It has no sense, so, maybe the reason is simply aesthetic or one way to quickly differentiate one size from another.

Also exists other types of milk packages such as transparent glass bottles, for natural milk which needs to be consumed quickly, and plastic bags, which are used in other countries. You can see the plastic bag packaging process in the next video:

CONCERT LOGISTICS – HOW IT WORKS

Two years ago from today I experience one of the most mind blowing concert of my life, Coldplay is one of my favorite bands and being able to see them for the first time was everything I ever imagine, but looking into the logistics that needs to be done I cant imagine how such big performance can get ready so quickly knowing they are in different cities almost every day.

I start to research, and I found out that A Head Full of Dreams Tour had a total of 122 shows across Latin America, Europe, North America, Oceania, and Asia.  They had 109 universal crew, 32 trucks and nine bus drivers; apparently the biggest bands usually have two huge stage set ups which toured around the world. Their entire stage, video and lighting is duplicated so while one stage is being set up in one city the other one was on it’s way to another town ready to be set up in another city. When the show rolls into a city the management employs a local company to supply the local road crew, usually they combine different freight modes—local trucking, cross-country trucking, air freight, and ocean freight.

These cargo companies handle everything from imports, exports, customs and carnets for the tour schedule, using trucks, air and sea freight. Musical instruments, tools and electronics are packed into custom-made steel cases and “work boxes” so they can be transported safely. These boxes are very heavy and the need to stay upright, they are rolled onto pallets and wrapped tightly so they are safe when in transit.

Providing transport for the European tour was supplied 32 Megacube trucks and trailers on the main production, the amounts of equipment being moved (which was in excess of 200 tonnes) means that physically getting the equipment between shows is a limiting factor for booking dates, South America was a touch tricky in that they had on average 20 hours to get 100 tonnes of equipment from door to door.

Not only can inventory and logistics control help the touring company keep track of everything, different technology can also help with promotional activities. Being able to use QR codes that are bound to help raise interest and brand recognition of the musical tour. By using this type of codes the band can give away free downloads of songs or videos, offer discounts for tickets or tour souvenirs, or hold a promotional giveaway for backstage passes, the uses for these codes are really only limited by your own creativity, and they help the tour connect with the exited people attending the show.

Here’s a small video clip of the concert 🙂

https://www.instagram.com/p/BEK2z2gAyPL/?taken-by=valefico320

View at Medium.com

https://medium.com/speedbox-is-typing/the-logistics-behind-concert-tours-7656f488b6c8 https://www.tpimagazine.com/coldplay-a-head-full-of-dreams/

 

View at Medium.com

 

RACE BEHIND THE RACE: THE LOGISTICS OF FORMULA 1

Formula 1 is not only what we see on TV during tests, qualifications and races. Much remains behind the scenes, and even the most faithful fan sometimes have to think about how the teams manage to put together all what we observe during each grand prix.

Logistics is one of the most expensive processes in Formula-1. This is a complex system, with the help of which teams deliver to the Grand Prix venue all equipment, cars, food and even trivial details of the interior, without which in the motorhome will never be cozy.

Work on logistics begins immediately after the appearance of the official calendar for the coming season. Each year the schedule changes, and therefore the places and dates of grand prix competitions are planned by the organizers of the championship together with representatives of the teams.

For transport all equipment logistic specialists use tricks and planes. And every huge metal boxes in which everything is packed with the team uniform, souvenirs to the fans, and technical equipment, have a clearly assigned place in the track.

When equipment from the base of each team arrives at the logistics center of DHL (which is only a few in Europe) specialists take all responsibility for the integrity and safety of the cargo. To transport all 30 tons of equipment for each individual team (multiply by 10 and get 300 tons of valuable cargo), DHL uses five cargo planes.

But there are times when there is not a two-week break between the stages, and the teams have to work hard to get things done by the deadline. If there are European races, then there is actually no rush, but if after the arrival in Shanghai the teams have to perform in Bahrain in a week (more than 6,000 kilometres) there is a big rush because before delivering all the equipment to a new track, specialists have to dismantle and pack all equipment after the previous race. Sometimes the team, in order to speed up the process, begins to dismantle and collect still before the signal of the flag in the current race, which periodically we can wee on the TV.

Only part of the cargo from the same Shanghai (the most valuable) will fly by air, the other part in 12-meter containers will go to Bahrain by sea, because air transportation is very expensive, and even the richest teams have to save on them!

In total, the staff of every team need from six to eight hours to pack everything. Of course, the speed of the dismantling is affected by the size of each individual circuit. The huge paddock of the Chinese track allows the teams to assemble all the equipment in the shortest time, which can not be said of the paddock in Monaco, where, due to limited space, the stable trucks are lining up in a long queue.

This continues from year to year, from race to race. With each season, the logistics in Formula 1 is being modernized, the cargoes are becoming compact and lighter. However, the importance of this process is still at the highest level, because of  it depends excellent work of each team wishing to fight for victories and titles.

Here you can watch a short video about logistic processes in Formula 1:

Planning and storage for the World Half Marathon Valencia 2018

Despite the cold, wind and rain, the celebration of the World Half Marathon Championships Valencia 2018 held on March 24 was a success. Thousands of people took to the streets to give support to all the participants of this emotional event. I enjoyed watching the illusion with which 315 professional athletes and 14,000 popular runners ran. In total people from 87 countries.

The participation of thousands of people and the presence of thousands of spectators undoubtedly requires great logistics and planning.

Let’s review some fundamental aspects to start a marathon. First you have to choose a place, establishing a circuit as central as possible, and a date, according to the weather. Permits will be requested from the competent authority. An important aspect is that the marathon is accessible, this requires to study the market and propose realistic objectives. Next, a detailed budget of all costs must be prepared. Moreover, it is convenient and necessary to look for sponsors, both national and international, in exchange for advertising their products or brands.

It is essential to guarantee the safety of the participants and assistants. The day of the race will have civil liability insurance. Traffic must be controlled and there must be a health presence every 5 km of the route. The refreshment points will be located every 2.5 km with water, isotonic and from km 20 they must have gels and solid foods. But an essential organizational aspect is the management of the registrations of the runners; for this purpose, a platform can be hired to integrate the payment with full guarantee.

Finally, one aspect to consider is the storage of the products until the day of the event. The refreshments and foodstuffs, the gifts, running bib, etc … are stored without unpacking and are organized with the number of runners in mind. The boxes or packages in which the products are donated are taken advantage of, since these will be stored for a short time.

If you take a look at this link, you will see the good planning of the event:

https://www.iaafvalencia2018.com/competition/official-programme/

 

GOI, the shipping revolution

Have you ever heard about any big company or logistic operator that is specialized in transporting heavy objects (like a fridge or a washing machine)?, probably the answer is not. That’s because, atleast in Spain, the only ones that give that service are freelancers that transport objects as their main work, but they are not united, they work for a very few clients and individually.

GOI was born from the unfulfilled demand of transporting objects between urban areas. They give a solution to all the people that needs to transport an object heavier than 40kg between different cities. They work as an intermediary between the carrier and the client, with companies and also with normal people. It is like the Blablacar of the logistic sector.

The company is less than 3 years old, but they already work with more than 30 companies, and some of them are very big ones, like IKEA or Wallapop.

GOI also has a professional carrier network in order to satisfy the demand of some important clients, sometimes they are not only an intermediary, they are also the carrier. Furthermore, the GOI carriers offer the option to set up the furniture or the object that they transported to the clients space, making a very good and satisfactory service.

But what makes their service something special and very attractive to their clients is, without any doubt, their super-low prices (example: 5€ for the transportation of a heavy object from Madrid to Alicante).

So the next time that you need to transport a heavy object to your mother’s village house or because you are moving to a new city, do not forget to use GOI’s services, they are cheap, fast and safe. Maybe that’s why they are growing strong and they are thinking about going abroad to cities like London, Berlin or Rome.

 

Sources and more interesting info:

http://www.emprendedores.es/ideas-de-negocio/goi-gluework-yaiza-canosa

https://www.muypymes.com/2016/02/03/goi-llega-el-blablacar-de-la-logistica

 

The Path of Life´s Foundation

To survive, two things are crucial. Getting food and staying hydrated.

As a rule of thumb, you can survive 3 weeks without food but only 3 days without water. The human body consists of more then 65% water and 2/3 of the muscle mass is actually water. Water is the most essential part for staying healthy and active.

People buy water automatically and almost every time in bottles. But did you ever ask yourself how the water gets into the bottle? And where does the water come from?

Now, I will give you answers to these questions based on the example of “Gerolsteiner”.

Common water is gained from ground- or surface water, but “Gerolsteiner” mineral water is obtained from 250m deep layers of dolomite found in the Vulcanic Eifel region.

Precipitation seeps down from the earth´s surface, where it runs through layers of dolomite. This special limestone rock contains calcium and magnesium, which is geologically specific to the Gerolstein region. During this process the rainwater will be filtrated, and it takes up calcium and magnesium.

The whole procedure takes about 50 to 100 years until the water can be gained.

The water will be pumped to daylight with the help of a well system.

After that, and a few quality controls, it will be bottled directly at the source. Followed by several further quality controls the bottles are getting sealed and labelled.

The water bottles will be packed in layers onto pallets. After the labelling of the pallets the water is ready for transport.

https://www.gerolsteiner.de/en/

If you want to learn more about the logistics at Gerolsteiner view the following video: