An Agile Internal Material Flow with Technology for the Medical Device Industry
The Initial Situation
WFL Millturn Technologies GmbH & Co. KG, based in Linz, Upper Austria, is the only manufacturer in the world to concentrate exclusively on production of multifunctional turning–boring–milling centers. Every single Millturn machine is a specialty machine, and the warehouse reflects this reality, storing about 30,000 active items – and that number is only increasing.
Despite the use of warehouse management software, space was becoming more and more of a problem at WFL. Constantly adjusting the sizes of the insertion compartments for the stored goods was making processing times longer and longer. A new solution was needed.
The Solution
As the first step, WFL chose six SSI LOGIMAT® vertical lift modules to free up space and improve picking performance. It was especially important for this successful machine manufacturing company that no additional expense should be incurred due to additional subsystems. For this reason, the vertical lift modules were integrated directly into the existing SAP environment with SPS EasyConnect and the combined expertise of SSI SCHAEFER and our partner Status C.
SSI SCHAEFER also supported WFL in the selection of suitable storage bins and in the initial relocation step involving about 12,000 of approximately 15,000 items total in the small parts area. This restructuring not only significantly improved the ergonomics of the work processes; batch picking was also introduced, which now allows WFL to process multiple orders in parallel and further improve performance.
The gradual conversion to an automatic small parts storage system has already paid off very well for WFL: Increasing the storage capacity freed up an entire 110 m² of floor space in the existing hall, while also increasing picking performance by up to 50%. And if the warehouse spectrum continues its strong growth trend, then there is enough space to increase capacity even further with additional SSI SCHAEFER vertical lift modules.
