Not only must food processing companies adhere to strict hygiene and traceability regulations, but they must also maintain throughput in cold storage environments. Sineurope Pte. Ltd., one of Asia's leading suppliers of premium-grade frozena and dried seafood, has invested in automation from Körber Business Area Supply Chain for its facility in Singapore.
Founded in 1981 by Melvin Foo, Sineurope's food products include sea cucumber, fish maw, abalone, and shark fins.
“The strength of our enterprise lies in the fast execution of orders, coupled with our ability to customize to the individual needs and exact specifications of our customers in Mainland China, Japan, Spain, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia with ample stock, allowing us to outmaneuver our competition on speed and out-compete on price,” said the company.
Sineurope needed to improve its space usage and energy consumption at its -20°C (-4°F) cold storage warehouse in Tuas Bay Walk, Singapore. It turned to Körber Supply Chain, a unit of global technology specialist Körber.
Sineurope invests in ASRS for worker safety
“With business running at full capacity, coupled with the disruption of the global logistics services, we have had to arrange expensive external storage,” explained Foo, CEO of Sineurope. “Additionally, as we're expanding operations and capacity, the constraint of looking for more staff is becoming increasingly difficult in the current environment, especially when working in a cold room storage.”
“The safety and health of our employees is extremely important, as well as reducing our carbon footprint and energy consumption, which is why we decided to partner with Körber,” he added. “They proposed a holistic solution comprising of an automated system and software that would solve our problems and get us ahead of the competition.”
Sineurope has invested in a multi-deep automated storage and retrieval system (ASRS) and software from Körber. The company is implementing an automated high-bay warehouse consisting of a 31 m (101.7 ft.)-high, freezer-rated pallet stacker crane equipped with two autonomous satellite vehicles (ASV).
Körber is deploying its K.Motion Warehouse Management System (WMS) to optimize Sineurope's warehouse operations. It will interface with the customer's enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. The new automation will help Sineurope cope with labor shortages, according to Körber.
Körber maximizes footprint, energy use
The multi-deep high-bay racking significantly increases storage density and creates more than 2,800 pallet locations within a small warehouse footprint of approximately 435 sq. m (4,682.3 sq. ft.). As human intervention is not required here, the system can prevent heat loss and achieve significant energy savings achieved, said Körber.
In addition, the regenerative systems in the stacker cranes keep energy consumption low. This will result in significant annual savings for Sineurope, said the company. The automated system will omit the need for external storage, maximize land utilization, and improve operational efficiency, it said.
The ASRS will also reduce the cost for cooling, thanks to a lower volumetric footprint from the higher storage density.
“Sustainability is becoming a growing focus in the supply chain,” said Win Thian Chai, CEO of Asian automation at Körber Business Area Supply Chain. “This may also be caused by consumers actively choosing eco-conscious companies over those that are not. With our solution, Sineurope can embrace its challenges and use it as a stepping stone to further business success.”
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