Kiva vs. Conveyor

Conveyors are out-dated, inflexible and maintenance intensive.

solution_conveyorIn the late 1700's belt conveyors were used to move sacks of grain.  During the early 1900's conveyor innovation arrived in the form of roller conveyor. Today both belt and roller conveyor are common, and state-of-the-art conveyor technology involves sectioning conveyors, sliding shoes, and various motor capabilities.  In other words, today's conveyors aren't that much better than those Henry Ford used to build the Model-T automobile.

In many 'modern' distribution centers miles of conveyors snake through the operation past racks of inventory.  Workers pick items and cases and place them in totes or cartons on the conveyor (sometimes called pick and pass) or workers pick items and cases and place them directly onto the conveyor which carries them to sortation areas where orders are consolidated.  With either method, orders are batched and waved. The order picking process is essentially single threaded. The apparatus is a giant inflexible fixture. Order cycle-times are long and processing orders still involves lots of human touches. Plus, many products are non-conveyable which forces exception handling. Productivity gains are possible with conveyors, but often the throughput of the entire facility is not much better than totally manual operations.

The Kiva Approach is better than conveyor.

solutions_multiple_stationsKiva solutions integrate a package of robotic material handling equipment and sophisticated software to provide the most accurate, productive and flexible order processing automation available.  Products come to the pickers when they need them.  Orders are picked, packed and shipped complete without batching and waving.  Order cycle times can be as short as 15 minutes and 'rush orders' can be inserted into the work schedule at any point.  Plus, with Kiva you can buy the gear you need when you need it and implement in a modular fashion which significantly lowers the investment risk inherent in bolted-down traditional automation.

The Kiva solution goes well beyond conveyor systems to deliver breakthrough performance by solving many order fulfillment challenges simultaneously.

  • Fast Picking
    The operator is presented with a new pick face location every six seconds, as if they had infinite pick face density with zero walking.
  • Real-time Orders
    Orders drop instantly to the operator without the delay of waves or batches, reducing cycle time to minutes.
  • Product Flexibility
    Storage pods and work stations can be configured to handle small items, large items, split-case and cut-carton items, full cases, fragile goods, odd-shaped packaging, and many products that won't work on a conveyor.
  • High Reliability
    With parallel equipment and no single point of failure, the Kiva warehouse automation system surpasses traditional solutions for uptime even in 24 by 7 operations.
  • High Volume Order Picking
    Kiva customers pick hundreds of thousands of lines per day in a single facility using the Kiva order fulfillment system.
  • High Accuracy
    Every item is verified by scanning the bar code or comparison to a photo, thereby reducing errors and eliminating the need for a separate QC function.
  • Inline Sortation
    Products and orders are automatically sorted during processing, enabling "pick to plan-o-gram" within an order and sequential truck loading.
  • High Storage Density
    Configurable pods, trays and bins, no forklift aisles, and complete vertical use of the facility using mezzanines means higher product density than existing solutions.
  • Zero Re-slotting
    Items are dynamically assigned to the best available location for storage and retrieval, which means that there is no need for profiling or re-slotting.