How Firestone Industrial Products Used Handling Unit Management and Mobile RF Technology to Improve Customer Satisfaction

John Fearnow – Firestone Industrial Products John Gardner – Dickinson + Associates

AGENDA

Who is Firestone

Who is Dickinson + Associates

Business Problem

Handling Units

Solution

Wrap Up

LEARNING POINTS

How Handling Units can be used for Load validation

Generating customer specific label formats at the point of use

Using Handling Units and Standard Transfer Order functionality to help pickers report correctly as they pick

Corporate Profile

4

Firestone Building Products

5

http://www.firestonebpco.com/ Ipad App http://www.firestonebpco.com/Tools/iPad_App/

Firestone Industrial Products – Markets

http://www.firestoneip.com/

Firestone Industrial Products – HD Truck & Trailer

Potentially up to 18 air springs on a class 8 truck & trailer application

31 U.S. Locations

Headquarters

Carmel, IN

Brussels, Belgium

Sao Paulo, Brazil

Rotterdam, Holland

Wolstzyn,Poland

Beijing, China

Mississauga, Ontario Woodstock, Ontario,

Turrialba, Costa Rica

Singapore

Gurgaon, India

Monterrey, Mexico

Firestone Industrial / Building Products – Global Reach

8

Firestone Business Technology Vision

To provide innovative, comprehensive, dependable solutions that support and align

with the objectives of the business.

9

10

We Are:

Focus: Delivery of quality SAP ERP, BI/Analytics, Mobility

consulting services to customers across North America,

Europe, and Asia.

Our People: A team of 140+ full-time SAP professionals reflects the

ideal mix of years of relevant business knowledge, very

strong SAP credentials, and solid communication skills.

Our team has an average of 15 years SAP and 19 years

business experience.

Offices: Chicago, IL (Headquarters)

Satellites: New York, NY | Scottsdale, AZ | Cincinnati, OH

Consistent Growth: 15 years revenue growth

We are:

11

Service Offerings

SAP Strategy + Implementation

Process Optimization

Services

SAP Upgrade Services

Support Desk

Professional Staffing

ERP

Mobility

Analytics

Customer Labeling Requirements

New labels •Carton Label, Shipping Label, Mixed Load Label

•Unique Packaging ID for each carton/pallet printed on the label

•Shipment ID printed on label

•Specific requirements for applying labels to packaging

New Packing List •Sorted by packaging ID

•Contents of each packaging ID listed on pack list

Changes to EDI ASN (need to transmit packaging ID structure)

12

Label to EDI Synchronization

13

Requirements for Applying Labels

Requirements for Applying Labels

Business Challenges

Weak print infrastructure Existing labeling infrastructure was on legacy systems Picking was in SAP but packing / load verification was a

manual paper based process Labels were printed after the fact from the legacy system Multiple pallet picks appeared on a transfer order as 1 line

item / pick Inventory discrepancies where noted when found and then

addressed after the fact in SAP Customers require customer specific labels on the pallets Customer shipments contain individual piece picks and

multiple pallet picks Customer requires labels and EDI information to reference a

shipment number Label data and ASN EDI data needs to be aligned

Obstacles for Printing Labels

Label formats vary based on Customer

Packaging material

Device type

How do you manage the complexity without a complicated program?

Handling Unit Management (HUM)

Definition – Process used to identify structures of packages and its material contents

Used to simplify logistics processes Inventory Management

Production Execution

Warehouse Management

Delivery Processing

Shipping

Handling Unit (HU) contains Materials

Other Handling Units (Nesting)

Key Attributes Unique Identification Number

Dimensions, Weights, & Volume

Status

Materials and quantities

Packaging materials

18

Handling Unit Structural Overview

123456

3000000051

1000000199

1000000203 1000000205

1000000206

1000000207

1000000208 1000000209

1000000210

Phased Approach

Implement packing functionality for label generation

Validate process and approach

Replace after the fact labeling with real time labeling

Implement Pick Pack into 1 operation to eliminate QA steps after pack

Final Design – Full SAP Solution

21

TC/IP Print Service

BFDP SAP Print Server ins140printsap

Smart

Form

Print Program

Output Determination Logic

Output Type

Shipment Packing

RF SAPConsole

Packing

RF SAPConsole Pick + Pack

Customer

Specific

Label Table

PC Label Design

Application

Std Text

Label design with standard tool (Bartender) Load Label format into SAP as standard text Output determination logic setup for different packaging materials (box, pallet, mixed load, etc) Z table links customer label design to packaging material output • Shipping location • Ship To Location • Device type

Pick and Pack – To-Be Process Vision

SAP Console 3

User Selects HU Type.

User picks and packs material.

User confirms activity.

Pallet Carton

User accesses Shipment.

4

5

6

7 123456

User prints labels. Attaches to the HU.

Nest HUs as required.

User stages complete HUs to

outbound Staging Lane.

TOs

Delivery

SAP Delivery Processing.

1

Transfer Order Creation.

Shipment Creation. 2

Assign Deliveries (Link TO’s)

Delivery Delivery

Delivery

TOs TOs

TOs

5

Business Process Flow

Pick and Pack Process Flow

Pick and Pack Start Screen / Dashboard

Provides overview of shipment How many picks remain Status of pack operation Total Number of Handling Units on the shipment Total number of Parent Handling Units Expected total weight of the shipment # of handling units that have been packed but not capped

General Operation

Enter the Packaging Material being packed. Press Enter

Handling unit is created.

Confirm the bin and quantity. Press enter to Validate

Confirm becomes active. Confirm to pack item into Handling unit

Item 1 is complete

Select Diff. Indicator Press F1 Confirm User is routed accordingly • F1 – Item is confirmed and packed • F7 – User is routed to Full Pallet

Screen

Enter bin and shortage quantity. Press F1 or F7

Pick / Pack item – Short Pick Process

Diff. Indicator Shipment being packed

1 Theft Difference will be posed to Storage Type “999” Storage Bin “LOST&FOUND”

2 Source Storage Bin

Difference will be posted back to the source Storage Type and Storage Bin (i.e. Stype “F1F” Bin “D1031019”)

3 Pick Difference

Difference will be posed to Storage Type “999” Storage Bin “DIFFERENCE”

New Post Processing Feature:

When a short pick occurs, RF will automatically attempt to create another pick to fulfill the shortage quantity.

IF a new item is created, it is added and sequenced in the list.

IF not, a warning message will be displayed.

Picking short and less material in the BIN than the system

System says pick 4, but only 1 in the bin

Tell system there is a quantity difference in the bin.

System will post the difference quantity to the differences bin. It will then create a new TO if there is more material available in the warehouse

For full Pallet, a shortcut

Selecting New HU prints out a label for the current handling unit and allows creating a new handling unit.

Multiple handling units of the same type can be created in 2 steps.

Confirm Bin and Quantity and select FulPal

Enter how many handling units the quantity represent and how many of parts in each HU.

Confirm and Cap creates the Number of handling unit labels

Handling Unit Management Screen

This shows detail of what should be in Handling Unit, Reprint of labels and deleting an uncapped handling unit. Capped handling units must be deleted using the SAP GUI Enter the selector number for the handling unit and F1 Sel to move to the packing screen

Lessons learned

Have to use gun and labels to design and test. This is a case where you have to do it exactly as an operator would

Work closely with people that do this every day during design and testing

Have a good partner and developer

BEST PRACTICES

Leverage standard SAP BAPI’s and Function Modules

Design the screen flow to enhance the physical flow

Look for creative ways to simplify processing and data maintenance

Don’t over engineer or under engineer, make it just right! Too much information can be an overload

Not enough feature / functionality causes additional overhead

Partnership

Extensive SAP Experience Right resources with the right skills

Project methodologies and tools

Transparent Communication

Cost-effective Solutions

A REAL partnership

Shared approach to risk management

Dedicated to IT and Business Success

Commitment to strategic SAP Roadmap

“Let’s just do it!!!” Because it’s the right thing to do!!!

THANK YOU FOR PARTICIPATING

Please provide feedback on this session by completing a short survey via the event mobile

application.

SESSION CODE: 1003

For ongoing education on this area of focus, visit www.ASUG.com