To meet the demands of its production line, Chinese healthcare technology company Sinocare has selected Hai Robotics’ custom autonomous case-handling robots (ACR) to manage parts of its manufacturing and storage processes.
Damien Skinner, country manager for UK and Ireland at Hai Robotics, explained how the ACR system could be used to improve the accuracy and efficiency of warehouse processes at the Robotics and Automation conference 2022.
This system has reportedly been fully integrated with Sinocare’s existing manufacturing execution system, as part of its ambition to wholly digitise its goods management process.
What’s more, this integration should now support operators to manage inventory, monitor the handling of products and track the movements of inbound and outbound goods.
Sinocare has claimed that, as a result of the collaboration, it has been able to advance its use of intelligent warehousing and intelligent manufacturing.
Sinocare’s Changsha warehouse is used for storage of semi-finished products and has a total footprint of 1,000m² (3,280ft²). After bringing in Hai Robotics’ ACR system, Sinocare claimed to increase its storage capacity from 7,500 totes to 12,000 totes, which marks an average storage density of about 13 totes per square metre.
Expanding on the partnership, Hai Robotics’ claims that its ACRs supported Sinocare logistically as they are able to operate in tight spaces of less than 1.2 metres (four feet) wide.
The second contributing factor the robot-maker mentioned was that two totes can be placed on shelf one in front of the other and that two shelves can be placed back-to-back when using the ACR. Hai Robotics said this effectively realises double-deep shelving, reduces the total number of aisles and creates a high-density storage unit that is four totes deep and accessible from two different sides. The solutions can then be stacked and stored throughout a warehouse, it added.
Sinocare chose to bring in increased automation at its site to both enhance the productivity of workers and maximise workflow efficiency. It claims to also want to develop an intelligent production ecosystem to the wider benefit of healthcare warehousing.
