Warehouse (WMS)

WMS stands for ‘Warehouse Management System’. It is a collection of several modules and implementations of software applications written to support the handling and stocking of fruit, vegetables, potatoes and wood.

Flex²B is a software application designed by Oryx and written the Fresh Produce sector with the main purpose to deliver information on inventory, quality, warehouse management, recall, track and trace processes. TnT or T&T stands for tracking and tracing. The current set of modules is introduced as from season 1996 to support box tracking, tracing and recalling.
All these modules are incorporated into one solution and will be described in the following chapters and sections. T&T is provided through GS1/EAN_Identification and information management for fast and accurate product withdrawal and recall.
The scope of this manual is to provide you the information on the applications, the interaction of the applications and the manipulations. It is not intended as an IT technical booklet.
When you want to know more information on the GS1/EAN part, we reference to the company’s documents of the ‘Track and Trace’ steering committee..
All these reference works are / should be available in the ISO-9xxx project. These documents may be part of any certification that is needed or obtained, such as BCR, HACCP, …
Currently Flex²B exists of several modules, all working with the same business logic. They can be used as the sole implementation or as a set of implementations, defined by the volume, complexity and purpose of the plant.
We do not have the intention to describe the data in the solution. This is described in a separate document by the Operations department of the Flex²B licensee.

TERMINOLOGY AND ABBREVIATIONS

WMS Warehouse Management System
Flex²B Flexible to Business
TnT or T&T Tracking and Tracing (EAN)
EAN (EAN-128) Set of rules and methods to provide tracking and tracing – obsolete, now moved to GS1-128 naming for global purposes
GS1-128 Set of rules and methods to provide tracking and tracing
ERP Administrative and sales application known by the name of SAP.
PDA Personal Digital Assistant (branded Symbol MC90xx). It is the portable scanning device that is used in the cold stores. The PDA types used are from the manufacturers ‘Motorola, Symbol and Telxon’. The applications that run on these machines are explained in a separate manual.
WiFi A method to support wireless devices such as the wireless PDA’s. The wireless access devices work together with a wireless access point. The coverage of this signal is limited and should be determined by a site survey.

 

 

The Warehouse Management System (WMS) is based upon plant, cold store location, cold cell, row from, row to, level from, level to.

Implementing a WMS system generally leads to a more efficient way of handling units and keeping the quality of Fresh Produce high. The sales system will automatically try to identify the oldest available units that meets the quality sold. This ensures that Fresh Produce suffers less from storage break down.

WMS is mandatory information, and does not restrict the rest of the operations.

It gives the Flex²B user the ability to organize its warehouse, to segregate Fresh Produce units to certain locations for further actions or operations. Flex²B allows for fast retrievals of a given unit in the warehouse(s), allows for the grouping of Fresh Produce based on quality, and for the segregation of contaminated units.

Warehouse management always holds the latest known location in the Warehouse. An open architecture allows external applications to communicate to the Flex²B backend system. The system can be used to guide the forklift system to efficiency (tailor made).