CASE STUDY

COcA-cOLA AMATIL, AUSTRALIA

Award winning solution for Coca-Cola Amatil.

The quality of solution offered by Swisslog outstripped their competitors and reflected their knowledge of CCAs business needs.
Derek ODonnell, National Logistics & Planning Manager Supply Chain, Coca-Cola Amatil

The Customer and their Requirements

Coca-Cola Amatil (CCA) has been located in Northmead for more than 30 years and over this time, has experienced high levels of continuous growth. The Northmead plant manufactures 60 million unit cases of soft drinks per year, producing product in cans at 2,000 per minute and PET bottles at 600 per minute. As CCA outgrew its on-site warehousing facilities, stock was stored in multiple offsite locations which created numerous problems such as high levels of stock write-offs, site congestion and other health and safety risks.

CCA required a new system to completely modernise their warehousing in Northmead and consolidate storage onto a single site. The new facility needed to address chain of responsibility requirements for transport and ensure accurate and timely replenishment to their other operations. The solution also needed to enable CCA to achieve world best practice levels of customer service, operational costs and stock accuracy. It needed to provide a safe working environment and facilitate their strategic growth platform whilst also meeting FIFO, quality and delivery requirements.

COCA COLA AMATIL / February 2010

The Solution
Swisslog worked in collaboration with CCA to assess the feasibility of different distribution options applicable to their New South Wales (NSW) operations, before designing the materials handling solution. Once the business requirements were determined and the design levels forecast and set, efforts shifted to designing the best material handling solution. Swisslog produced a design which focused on innovative methods of combining and evolving proven technology to the site limitations and also on optimising the entire facility to provide the most cost effective solution.

Key design elements are: Storage Systems Given CCAs high pallet storage requirement and their limited availability of on-site space, Swisslogs solution maximised vertical height using a crane fed automated storage and retrieval system (ASRS). This allowed a 32m tall High Bay which can store the equivalent of 158 million cans! The racking design was optimised to minimise both building and material handling costs. A clad rack design was chosen to achieve these benefits whereby the racking itself forms part of the construction of the building. Clad rack also enabled a quicker implementation schedule versus a more traditional design where a free standing rack is built inside a conventional building.

Transportation Hub A monorail linking the receiving, storage and staging operations allows pallets to be quickly and easily transported from any source to any destination within the system. During the design phases the transportation and handling strategies were optimised to enable the monorail to transport 740 pallets every hour. A pallet is delivered to a destination by the monorail every 5 seconds. Staging Systems Due to CCAs high system throughputs, it was essential to ensure the system provided adequate staging to enable a continual flow of pallets to the docks. The staging areas provide operational flexibility during peak and non peak periods and were designed to enable the

LOGISTICS DATA
High Bay Warehouse Length Height Width Footprint Quantity of Steel Capacity 127 m 32 m 92 m 11,680 m2 3,000 tonnes 55,432 pallets Material Handling System Infeed Production Infeed External Conveyor Monorail Capacity Monorail Trolley Speed Automated Cranes 240 pallets / hr 60 pallets / hr More than 1.5km 740 pallets / hr 7.2 km / hr 13 @ 28m tall Staging and Loading 6 Fully Automated Truck Loading Docks 500 m of Pallet Flow Lanes Total Staging Capacity: 824 pallets, 30 trucks Total Outfeed: 540 pallets / hr

COCA COLA AMATIL / February 2010

SWISSLOGS ScOPE OF SUPPLY

> All materials handling equipment for the facility, including controls software. > Warehouse design. > Engineering and system planning. > Overall project management. > Continuous customer support. > Lifetime partnership.

loading of a trailer whilst the system automatically stages the next load. In order to achieve the targeted truck turn around times, automated loading was considered vital given the technologys fast response times. Between the 6 docks over 15 trailers can be loaded every hour, which is one 22 pallet trailer every 4 minutes.

very few staff. There are just 26 people employed directly in the High Bay by CCA. Most importantly CCAs customers have benefited from the completion of the Northmead High Bay in a number of ways including very high inventory accuracy and on time delivery. The state-of-the-art warehouse is now the largest of its kind in the southern hemisphere and has one of the highest throughput handling systems in the world. The Northmead warehouse was recognised by the Logistics Association of Australia in 2009 when it was awarded with a Smart Award for Excellence in Supply Chain Innovation. It also scooped a prestigious Mercury award in 2009 for its Technology Application.

The Benefits
In addition to effectively enabling significant growth, Swisslogs solution provided CCA with the ability to consolidate its NSW warehousing operations, improve its efficiency and incorporate its environmental initiatives. Also, despite its 24 hours a day, 7 days a week operation, the High Bay requires

CUSTOMER DATA
Coca-Cola Amatil is the principal CocaCola licensee in Australia and independently manufactures its own soft drinks and mineral waters. It bottles and distributes Coca-Cola soft drinks and other beverages in several countries. www.ccamatil.com www.coca-cola.com Products As well as Coke and its various derivatives, Coca-Cola Amatil produces a number of other soft drinks, including Mount Franklin, Deep Spring natural mineral waters, Neverfail Water, Grinders Coffee, GV Fresh and GV To Go juices, Fanta, Lift lemon drinks, Pump bottled water, Powerade sports drink, Sprite lemonade, and the Kirks range of lower-cost soft drinks including Kirks creaming soda. Location Coca-Cola Amatil employs more than 16,000 people in five countries across the Asia-Pacific.

COCA COLA AMATIL / February 2010

iNTErViEw wiTh DEREK ODONNELL, NATioNAl LogiSTiCS & PlANNiNg MANAgEr SUpplY ChAiN, COCA-COLA AMATIL

CCA and Swisslog have an enduring relationship, what significance does that have to your business? Swisslogs high level of business understanding provides pragmatic, business ready solutions to address our needs. The cultural alignment between both companies creates common objectives and enables the delivery of CCAs growth strategies. Swisslog also provides a consistent WM platform across CCA sites, giving real-time visibility of our inventory and enabling productivity-enhancing automation. Describe the business benefits which the Northmead High Bay Warehouse (HBW) project brings to CCA? The Northmead HBW provides us with accuracy of inventory through the WMS and also efficiency of operation; we run with just 6 staff to move 8,000 pallets a day, 500 pallets an hour. The automation capability and reliability allows us to despatch on time whilst productivity gains have lead to reduced costs in our supply chain. The HBW has also enabled us to reap substantial sustainability benefits which were fundamental to the design of the solution. Perhaps most importantly, the solution has allowed us to guarantee that we can meet customer promises every day at a high level due to improved customer service levels. CCA is a thought leader in using automation in Australia. How has this influenced company culture? The HBW perfectly supports our cultural behavioural drive for Innovation and Customer Centricity. We are always trying to find better ways to serve our customers and will explore automation where appropriate to differentiate our offering to them. CCA has built a high performance culture and the HBW is another lever in our ability to attract a high calibre of people into supply chain roles. The business investment in this site

regenerated pride in the workplace for our employees, being able to showcase to our external customers but also to our employees families the sophistication and professionalism of CCAs sites, our determination to grow our business performance and our ability to add value to customers. Inevitably, building a site of such quality raises the bar and prompts great opportunities to progress and learn further for all our employees. Why did you choose Swisslog as a partner for the Northmead project? The quality of solution offered by Swisslog outstripped their competitors and reflected their knowledge of CCAs business needs. Swisslog has built an excellent history with CCA as regards to the strength of their software offering. They had a proven track record with CCA in automation systems at other sites in our network. Swisslog has built a strong bench of people both in Australia and in Europe to support their customers. What are the key elements in the success of CCA? We are absolutely committed to improving customer service to a level which clearly differentiates us from our competitors in the minds of our customers. Our commitment to building a high performance culture and attracting diverse, talented people provides CCA with competitive advantage in the marketplace. Our knowledge of our customers and our drive to have a beverage for every occasion are also key elements to our success. How do you see the future for CCA? CCA will continue its passion to drive growth through all opportunities to improve customer service, increase revenue and reduce costs. CCA will always seek to innovate in order to add value to our business and to that of our customers.

Swisslog Australia Pty. Ltd Building C Suite 2, Level 1 37-41 Oxford Street Tel. +61 (0)2 9869 5900 wds.au@swisslog.com www.swisslog.com