Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (PSIwms)

In 1999 two Munich firms - Krauss-Maffei Wehrtechnik and Wegmann Co. GmbH & KG, merged in one company under the name Krauss-Maffei Wegmann GmbH & KG Co. (KMW). Having integrated mutually supplementing products and experience, KMW became the company conducting in Europe in the field of production and service of armored wheel and track laying vehicles. Complex concepts of repair and maintenance and also a full logistical support are included in the system of customer service. So, in 2002 turnover of this enterprise with number of staff about 2300 people reached 600 million euros.

Initial situation

After merge of two companies in Munich the new schedule system of resources of the enterprise (ERP) was introduced. After market assessment, the company selected the product PSIpenta.com of production of PSI concern. The organizational changes which resulted from merge also affected logistics, and besides demanded updating of old, 10-year age, the software of management of a warehouse. In connection with complex structure of a warehouse, the WMS program (warehouse management system) provided by former schedule system of resources of the enterprise was incapacitated. KMW was necessary a specialized warehouse management system for automatic operation of a warehouse which would be able to display all complex of warehouse transactions. After intensive comparison of several standard systems, KMW selected the software for management of a warehouse of production of PSI Logistics company. In addition to functionality of this product, the major advantage was that both ERP systems and WMS occurred from one producer – PSI concern and therefore ease of their interaction was provided from the very beginning.

Among the requirements formulated for future warehouse management system were: the flexible possibility of storage adapted to conditions on one warehouse place of several commodity articles, and capability of formation of transport units depending on relevant requirement. Depending on the piece number of articles a system had to determine the necessary size of transport units. As deliveries are made by the principle "just in time" and, respectively, with a short cycle, there were high requirements were imposed also to optimization of operation of pilers and handling equipment, including in a providing zone. Here a system had to locate proper optimization methods of order processing on a complete set for prevention of unnecessary material handling.

Implementation in three stages

After development of technical specifications in June, 2001, in December implementation process which was executed in total in three stages began. At the first stage, within several weeks, the existing warehouse management system was uninstalled, and new is set – since the beginning in the mode of off-line control by a warehouse. It is fast replacement it was necessary for immediate implementation, the firms of logistic requirements created as a result of merge. At the second stage operational integration with schedule system and production managements via the special interface was executed. This phase began after complete debugging of all basic data in an ERP system. After complete program implementation of PSIpenta.com, operation in a foreground mode, without preliminary work in the testing mode began. At the same time, that will cope with the increased production volumes, the hoisting-and-transport equipment of 10-year age on complete set section was reorganized. The changed processes of transportation and a complete set can be displayed within the common software of management of a warehouse without any additional adjustments.

Configuration

The hardware configuration consists of the Windows NT Server server. Data storage is performed in the Oracle database 8.