Warehouse operators and warehouse management systems encounter a broad spectrum of challenges to ensure the shortest possible shipping times to their customers and maintain their position on the market. The picking process is the most time-demanding among all core warehouse processes. Optimisation of picking is crucial for effective warehouse operation, since it represents the majority of warehousing costs.
In this thesis we analyzed, proposed and implemented optimisations of the picking process in the manual warehouse. We prepared a logical model of the warehouse, which is based on a hierarchical representation of the warehouse locations. Using this model we reduced the number of locations, which have to be considered during the computation of the shortest picking path in the implemented algorithms. We developed a module for picking path optimisation, which selects one of three implemented algorithms based on the problem size and the warehouse type. To further improve the picking process we introduced changes to the semi-automatic forklift operations and developed a graphical web interface for the warehouse picking heatmap.
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