Inside SP Logistics: Taking robotics to a new level

SB Logistics Corp.
Ichikawa City,
Chiba, Japan

Square Footage: 600,000 square feet used for e-fulfillment on two floors. In total, the facility measures 2.4 million square feet.

Products Handled: A variety of items, depending on the customer, including consumables, consumer electronics, toys and food items.

SKUs: 50,000 SKUs and approximately 2,000,000 units

Throughput: 5,000 pieces per hour through the shipping sorter

Shifts: 1 shift, 7 days a week.

Learn more by reading the feature story “SB Logistics moves toward lights-out warehouse”

Receiving

Inventory is received (1) in trucks versus tractor trailers. While some inventory may be palletized, most is floor loaded. Items are manually unloaded for processing in an inbound receiving area (2) where they are inspected and inducted into the warehouse management system (WMS).

Putaway/Storage

Large or bulky items that cannot be handled by automation are stored on shelving in the manual storage area (3). Inventory that can be stored in the mini-load automated storage and retrieval system (AS/RS) is placed into storage totes and inducted onto a conveyor and sortation system installed on the mezzanine level (4). Those totes are conveyed to the AS/RS (5), which automatically stores them. They are now available for order fulfillment.

Picking

The facility fills both single-line and multi-line orders. There are automated and manual processes for both types of orders, since some items are either too heavy, bulky or fragile to be handled by the robots. At present about 60% of items, and at least 50% of the orders, can be handled automatically.

Manual

Inventory for manual pick orders is conveyed to the picking areas (6) either from the manual shelving units or the AS/RS. Single-line orders are picked to the shipping container and then sent to a manual pack line (7). When packing is complete, the parcels are inducted (8) onto the shipping sorter and sorted to the shipping area (9). Multi-line orders are batch picked and then combined into orders at a manual pack station. They are then sorted to shipping.

Goods-to-robot picking and packing

Donor totes are retrieved from the AS/RS and conveyed to single-line (10) or multi-line (12) robotic picking stations. Single-line orders are picked to a shipping container and conveyed to an automated pack station (11) where the order is finalized, sealed and then sorted to shipping. Multi-line orders are batch-picked and conveyed to an automatic packing station (13) where a robot combines the items into orders. The shipping container is then automatically sealed and sorted to shipping.

Shipping

Once parcels arrive in shipping, they are loaded onto roller cages and loaded onto an outbound truck.

System suppliers

Systems Design and Implementation: SoftBank Robotics
Piece Picking and Packing Robots: Berkshire Grey