Do you actually know where your forklifts are?

Classical forklifts dominate factories and warehouses worldwide – these transport vehicles are an indispensable part of intralogistics. Without them, it’s impossible to imagine moving around goods that are stored in wire baskets or on Euro pallets. And every year, around 1.5 million new forklifts are added to the mix – though in the last two years this figure was somewhat lower due to the pandemic. But while the automation and optimization of material flows and resource utilization have long dominated the inbound and outbound logistics process, circumstances are often different when you look behind the factory door at intralogistics.

As a result, forklift drivers literally buzz around the store floors of some global corporations all day, checking every single container to see if there is work waiting for them. This inefficient procedure leads to countless empty runs and unnecessarily wastes the forklift drivers' valuable time - in view of the country's striking shortage of skilled workers, a luxury we cannot afford. Not to mention the more than 13,000 accidents involving forklifts in Germany every year.

Make Gabelstapler smart!

So it's high time forklifts and manually operated offline industrial vehicles were made smart for in-house operation by integrating them into an overarching automated control system for the store floor, e.g. as part of traffic management. The only question is: how can this be accomplished without excessive effort and in a cost-effective manner?

The answer is: SYNAOS Real-time Localization. Our compact sensor kit offers digital visualization even for your company's manually operated vehicles, thereby creating transparency for all transport resources. SYNAOS Vehicle Localization determines the position of your vehicles. In this way, locations and route data can be collected easily and cost-effectively, generating data-based insight about the monitored vehicle fleet. What makes it unique: Our solution also integrates manual vehicles into your company's order planning. In combination with the SYNAOS Intralogistics Management Platform, delays or interruptions of individual vehicles can be detected at an earlier stage or reduced. Demand is automatically recalculated when the framework conditions change, which ensures better planning and use of available capacities. This is a cost-effective way of optimizing your intralogistics processes instead of just automating them. As a result, efficiency in this area can be improved considerably.

Easy installation with Plug and Play

The sensor kit from SYNAOS can be easily installed on any vehicle in less than 30 minutes, connects via WLAN and is supplied with electricity through the vehicle’s on-board network. An integrated camera records visual information for spatial localization. Image processing is carried out by a powerful computer that processes the image data directly on board and then deletes the data immediately. No sensitive data is uploaded – a major bonus when it comes to data protection.

Your intralogistics processes also benefit from digitally networked systems that enable extensive “self-organization” on your shop floor: Industry 4.0 allows people, machines, plants, vehicles and products to communicate and cooperate directly with one another. Intralogistics takes on a key role here. Bring all your transport resources into the digital age – easily and cost-effectively.

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