Towards Zero-Warehousing Smart Manufacturing (ZWSM): IoT-enabled synchronization in unitized logistics and production

Abstract:

In the past half century, many manufacturers have been striving to achieve the “zero inventory” manufacturing. Suppliers would build the warehouse near the production line to hedge against the strict time delivery requirements for production in zero inventory. Although manufacturing processes have been improved, excessive warehousing operations have been brought along the supply chain. Recently, some large manufacturers have invested heavily for industrial 4.0 and warehousing automation, thereby to facilitate warehousing operations and solve the expanding demand for storage space. Although warehousing automation can greatly enhance the efficiency, warehousing is still a non-value-adding process. Warehousing operations should be simplified as much as possible. This thesis makes a comprehensive introduction to a new manufacturing paradigm named Zero-Warehousing Smart Manufacturing (ZWSM) from aspects of concept, practises, principles, and core technologies. ZWSM basically aims to avoid traditional non-value-adding warehousing operations such as put away and order picking. Further to reduce the warehousing space for operations to the minimum