AM-Automation Automates Small Parts Logistics for Praxisdienst

Higher efficiency in processing a steadily growing order volume: With this goal in mind, Dieckhoff & Ratschow Praxisdienst GmbH & Co.KG from Longuich near Trier decided to implement an AutoStore system from AM-Automation.

(Offenau/Longuich) Compresses and swabs, syringes and needles, laboratory scales or complete surgical facilities: Whatever medical professionals need for their work in terms of equipment or consumables is readily available at the logistics center of Dieckhoff & Ratschow Praxisdienst. Thanks to automated small parts logistics, the Europe-wide active supplier of medical products can now reliably manage the unexpected exceptional situation of the Covid-19 pandemic.

20,000 Items

Founded in 1953 in Wuppertal, the company successfully established itself as the first provider to deliver the complete range of medical products via shipping to all parts of the Federal Republic. With the move to Longuich, Praxisdienst expanded its catchment area to the neighboring Benelux countries and the entire DACH region starting in 1978; since 2008, the entire range has also been accessible via online shop beyond that. Covering more than 7,000 m², the offerings held in the logistics center comprise around 20,000 items, distributed across 26,000 storage locations. These are predominantly small parts that were previously stored in two-meter-high shelving units and picked manually.

Wasted Space in High Halls

With the increasing order volume, Praxisdienst found it increasingly difficult to reliably manage demand over the past years. “In order to continue supplying customers in a timely manner, the duration of order processing had to be drastically reduced,” says Praxisdienst Managing Director Michael Heine. The company preferred a solution to optimally utilize the available space in the logistics center. The manually accessible shelving units occupied a large part of the area, while at a hall height of 7.5 m, a lot of space was also being “wasted.” As an alternative, only an automated small parts storage system was considered by Praxisdienst, which should be quickly realizable without interrupting ongoing operations. “Initially, we considered a paternoster concept,” reports Michael Jäkel, who is responsible for E-Business and IT at Praxisdienst, “but the assembly would have been quite complex, and we wouldn’t have been able to achieve the desired picking numbers with that.” In the event of an error, a large part of the items in a shelf would also be temporarily inaccessible, which could quickly lead to a backlog in the entire order processing. Therefore, the company saw the necessary requirements from its perspective only fully met by the AutoStore concept: maximum densification of storage space, rapid provision of requested items, and minimal downtime.

Exceptional Situation with Time Window

Praxisdienst could hardly have chosen a better time for the deployment of AutoStore. After AM-Automation was commissioned to realize the project in December 2019, the medical product supplier soon found itself in an unpredictable exceptional situation due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The interest in hygiene products such as disposable gloves and protective masks reached unprecedented heights within a very short time, while at the same time, demand could increasingly be met less due to interrupted supply chains. On the other hand, this opened up a time window for the smooth transition of intralogistics: After the preparatory ground work in spring, AM-Automation began the AutoStore assembly in early June. While the storage areas slowly filled up again with urgently needed supplies during the summer, the automated small parts storage was quickly completed and gradually put into operation by mid-August. “Considering the second wave of infections, it was perfect timing,” says Praxisdienst Managing Director Michael Heine. And Johannes Traub, Sales Manager of AM-Automation, adds: “The schedule was crucial for the entire project, but fortunately, we were able to provide all necessary AutoStore components without any issues despite restricted supply chains.”

Less Space, Higher Performance

Meanwhile, the small parts range of Praxisdienst has been completely relocated from the shelving units to AutoStore and now finds space in 15,000 AutoStore bins with an external height of 330 mm each, with a volume of 75 l each. Ten robots take care of providing the requested items on the top of the system, which are picked and prepared for shipping at four workstations at the foot of the nearly 7.5 m high structure. “The space requirement for our small parts storage has decreased by two-thirds, while the performance in order processing has more than doubled,” Managing Director Heine is pleased to report. And even though there are still temporary supply shortages for certain items from the Praxisdienst range, the AutoStore system is now operating at full speed in two-shift operation – currently, Corona test kits are in high demand. “With the realization of the project, we were not only able to manage the unexpected surge in demand but also sustainably expand our market position overall,” summarizes Heine. And to ensure that this remains the case, AM-Automation plans to expand the newly commissioned AutoStore system to a capacity of 27,869 bins in just a few months.

Photo: © AM-Automation GmbH
www.am-automation.de   www.praxisdienst.de