DC Velocity - June 2012

they are acting as agents to the owner of the goods.

Not surprisingly, the group said it sides with the ruling from the 11th circuit.

Part of the problem, according to IWLA President and CEO Joel Anderson, is the railroads’ practice of railcar “bunching,” where the carrier dumps more cars at a siding than were originally agreed upon. Anderson argues that if the intermediary expected to receive six cars at a consignee’s siding and instead was sent 12, it shouldn’t be responsible for the additional six cars.

Holly Arthur, a spokeswoman for the Association of American Railroads, the trade group representing the nation’s major railroads, said the organization is reviewing the proceeding and declined further comment. ;

—M.S.

SDI Group buys AL Systems’ technology assets

The SDI Group said it has acquired the technology assets of AL Systems Inc., based in Rockaway, N.J. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Los Angeles-based SDI said in a statement that the acquisition expands its material handling and order fulfillment software platform by adding RF-, light-, and voice-based paperless order picking and light-based order sortation and packing. These platform additions will complement SDI’s existing material handling solutions and services.

The transaction includes the purchase of AL Systems’ DynaPro software products and engineered order fulfillment solutions, SDI said.

SDI and AL Systems have been working together for several years on various projects, SDI said.

SDI added that most of AL Systems’ employees would join SDI. ;

—M.S.

alliances

Gap Inc., a global specialty retailer, has selected TGW Systems to install an automated material handling system in the company’s Southern U.S. distribution center, located near Nashville, Tenn. … TranSystems used the OptiSlot slotting program from Optricity to organize most of Nexcom’s 12,400 products within the new 360,000- square-foot Nexcom distribution center in Suffolk, Va. … Kenco, a provider of value-added distribution, public warehousing, and transportation services, is now offering integrated international retail and logistics services with Germany-based Hermes Fulfilment. … WNS (Holdings) Ltd., a provider of global business process outsourcing (BPO) services, has entered into a strategic partnership with GT Nexus, a cloud-based supply chain service provider, to deliver plat-form-based BPO services and solutions to the shipping and logistics industry. … Retailer Aritzia has chosen to roll out RedPrairie’s supply chain execution solutions in its 80,000-square-foot distribution center in Vancouver, British Columbia. In addition, Beaver Street Fisheries Inc. and its sister company Bahamas Food Services have selected RedPrairie’s enterprise solutions to help support their rapidly expanding food distribution businesses. … I.D. Systems has executed a mul-tiyear contract with one of the world’s leading logistics service providers to deploy its Veri Wise Track and Trace system across a fleet of intermodal containers.