Voice-directed picking...

Itella Logistics Oy uses voice-directed picking solutions at its Voutila 3PL warehouse in Vantaa, Finland. It enables the company to serve its warehousing customers more efficiently and with better delivery accuracy.

At Voutila warehouse the voice solution is used for picking many kinds of products, for example automotive spare parts, electronics, clothing and DIY products. Voice works well for Itella Logistics in a multi-client picking environment. In addition, terminal sorting is handled with voice technology.

Development director Mika Larinen and operative manager Jarkko Vuorenheimo have been in charge of implementing the new picking application. They are very pleased with the results.

- Voice is an efficient and a well-functioning solution for order picking . It is also a more environmentally friendly option than paper-based picking. Traditional list based picking would consume mountains of paper every day , says Vuorenheimo.

Client-specific customisation

The principal idea behind third-party logistics is that a company outsources logistics to a service provider like Itella Logistics and thereby is able to concentrate on its core business. The customer is freed from fixed-costs and pays only for the space used and work done. Basic services can be upgraded with different value-add services: products and equipment can be prepared for store or end-user.

Larinen tells that the implementation of voice in a multi-customer environment requires customer-specific customisation. Each customer has its own implementation project.

- The picking of the products is carried out according to specific model. For one customer the products are picked by to salesunits, and for others the same products are picked by single items. All these instructions need to be stored in the system, so that the picker knows exactly what to do.

Voice has been working so well that the system has also been extended to the warehouse in Tuusula . Itella is an international company with operations in several different countries. Are there plans to take Voice technology outside Finland?

- With the first phase of the expansion the focus is in Finland where we have several sites. At the moment voice-directed work is used at two sites, and from now on we´ll move ahead case-by-case, Larinen states.

Award-winning efficiency

According to Larinen and Vuorenheimo the cooperation with Optiscan has worked well. In addition to cooperation they are pleased with results of the project. Customer feedback has been positive because picking is now better timed and more accurate than before.

- The efficiency has approved by 10-30% depending on customer, and the level of errors has been reduced by half. With one customer the accuracy of picking during the first 6 months was up to a perfect 100%, tells Vuorenheimo.

Larinen and Vuorenheimo emphasize that thanks to Voice the working process is transparent which enables better supervision, tracking and management of the staff. The ability to transfer staff from one customer to the next is also higher because customer-specific instructions are included in the system and there is no need for pickers to rely on their own memory or experience.

Itella Group has also noticed the benefits of Voice. The voice-directed picking project won two categories in Itella´s own InnoMoves competition where development projects from eight countries competed with each other. In addition, the voice-solution received a special recognition award in this competition.

There´s no going back, say the pickers

Larinen and Vuorenheimo explain that the pickers have adopted Voice extremely well. Excellent communication and user training have made it easy to get accustomed to new working methods. The return to the old the ways sometimes causes problems.

The Voutila warehouse employs pickers between 16-64 years of age. The young as well as the old have adopted the use of Voice easily. Those who don´t speak Finnish as their first language can also use Voice without effort.

-In terminal sorting our staff consists of several nationalities. They are able to use voice providing that they understand basic Finnish. The answers can be taught to the system with one´s own native language, Vuorenheimo stresses.