Indigo recently sponsored and exhibited at the inPower Conference for Infor XA, Infor LX & Infor System 21 Users in Orlando, Florida and it proved an interesting event. It was inspiring to see that there are so many successful businesses who continue to see the benefit of their investment in an Infor ERP solution running on the IBM i Series platform. A big factor behind this decision will be down to the exceptional reliability offered by the iSeries.

The inPower conference offered two and a half days of user-led roundtable discussions, expert-run education breakout sessions and networking, all of which resulted in a vast amount of knowledge exchange geared to prepare delegates for change. Interestingly, it was clear that some US manufacturers and distributors attending the conference had not been updating their business processes as frequently as many of their European counterparts. This is potentially due to fewer competitive forces and lower labour costs in the US, which in turn means investing in productivity and accuracy enhancing warehouse management software can be considered less of an urgency.

Yet from discussions, it was clear that warehouses everywhere are facing a universal set of problems. Managing their inventory and trying to reduce the levels of inventory they need to hold, coping with more frequent and smaller order volumes, the rise of ecommerce, identifying ways to become more agile and less reactive, anticipating customer needs more quickly and generally being able to achieve more with fewer resources.

A surprising number of warehouses are still managing their logistics operations using paper, yet they could be seeing significant cost reductions using a Warehouse Management System (WMS) integrated with their ERP system.

For instance, benefits such as:

Improved inventory management

• Up to 99% improved stock accuracy
• Efficient raw materials floor delivery and replenishments
• Accurate cycle counting and improved stock auditing.

Improved sales order fulfilment

• On Time In Full (OTIF) performance
• Greater agility to respond to omni-channel market demands
• Optimised picking with pre-allocated travel paths to minimise time between locations.

Improved decision making

• Immediate real-time access to accurate stock information at every location
• No time delays between inventory transactions and system updates
• Full audit trail for end to end traceability.

Improved productivity

• Greater labour efficiency from warehouse operatives, due to system driven solution
• No time wasted searching for available putaway spaces
• Best possible use of available space.