Warehousing and automation is the software that runs a warehouse, together with the robots that move goods inside it. A warehouse holds a company's stock until an order arrives. Its software must know where every item is, decide which orders to fill first, and tell each worker or robot what to do next.
Two systems make the main decisions. The order management system (OMS) receives every order, from the company's website, its shops and the marketplaces it sells on. It decides which warehouse or store will fill each order. The warehouse management system (WMS) then runs the work inside that warehouse. It knows the shelf position, called the bin, that holds each item. It gives each worker a pick list, the items to collect in the order of the aisles. Workers scan every item with warehouse mobile apps on handheld scanners, so the count in the WMS stays correct.
In a traditional warehouse, the worker walks along the aisles to each shelf. This is called person-to-goods picking. Consider a big sale weekend, when a fashion seller's orders can rise to several times the normal number in a day. Walking then becomes the slowest part of the work. So warehouses add machines.
Goods-to-person robots drive under a shelf, lift it and carry it to a worker who stays at one station. Autonomous mobile robots (AMR) carry bins and pallets around the floor, finding their own way, with no tracks. A pallet is the flat wooden platform on which goods are stacked, so that a forklift can move them. An automated storage and retrieval system (AS/RS) stores goods in tall, dense racks and fetches them by machine. At the end of the line, a parcel sorter sends each packed parcel to the lane for its destination. The last step still done mostly by hand is choosing one item from a bin. Robotic picking arms now use computer vision to do that too.
Not every business needs its own warehouse all year. With on-demand warehousing, a business rents space by the month or by the pallet. A brand that does not want to run a warehouse at all can pay an e-commerce fulfilment company to store its stock, and to pack and send its orders.
India has become a centre for warehouse robotics. Several robotics start-ups are based in Bengaluru, and one of the leading goods-to-person robot companies was founded in Gurugram. Quick commerce companies, which deliver groceries in minutes from small neighbourhood warehouses called dark stores, are among the places where these machines are now being tested.