BY JAMES COOKE, EDITOR AT LARGE
techwatch
Buying a WMS?
Have it your way
MOST DISTRIBUTION CENTERS WANT IT THEIR WAY
when it comes to running their warehouse operations. That’s
why warehouse management systems (WMS) often have to be
modified at the time of installation. Trouble is, that’s not cheap.
Making changes to a WMS package usually requires custom
code, and paying a programmer to write individual lines of
code jacks up the cost of software implementation and adds
time to the project.
Recent developments in software programming are making it
possible for the next generation of WMS vendors to install their
solutions faster and more cheaply. By taking
advantage of so-called “toolkits” for cus-tomization, these vendors avoid the task of
writing individual code for each client. “The
toolkit helps the vendor create more functionality without any coding or with minimal
coding,” says Phil Obal, president of IDII, a
consulting firm that specializes in supply
chain software.
To add the functionality needed for a specific warehouse operation, toolkits take
advantage of tables and English-like commands, explains Stephen Pullo, owner of Blue
Label Systems Inc., a consulting and systems
integration company. For example, if a warehouse wants fish to be put away in the freezer section, as opposed to the refrigerated area, the software programmer can encode those instructions in the table. And it
doesn’t stop there. The programmer can even add a notation
prohibiting fish from being placed next to the ice cream. In the
past, Pullo says, incorporating these kinds of restrictions on
item placement would have required hundreds of lines of code.
Although some of the larger WMS vendors have begun
adopting this approach to implementation, they’re not the only
ones to do so. A couple of lesser-known companies are also tak-
ing advantage of these advances in software programming. One
vendor offering this type of toolkit solution is Made4net, a sup-
ply chain software specialist based in Paramus, N.J. Amit Levy,
director of marketing for the Americas at Made4net, says his
company’s WMS solution allows the user to configure business
rules and policies to reflect its own workflows. This capability
means, for example, that each distribution
center can tailor activities like putaway and
picking to its own requirements.
