The challenge here was to deliver raw material from the warehouse area to the production area, deliver pallets, and transport waste materials. The Unilever Konya HPC Factory utilized long milk runs that led to safety issues, time loss, labor costs, mistakes, and more. With four different material types needing to be transported twenty-four hours nonstop for over 100 distribution points, it was a complex issue requiring a sophisticated solution.

The first challenge was the inefficiency of the milk runs travelling through the production area. In this case, the milk run method took up too much space and led to many problems. It posed safety concerns to the workers on the floor and caused a crowded workspace with limited clearance of machines and equipment, narrow paths, and several turns. A high level of dependence on manual labor posed yet another problem. With a high driving workload of milk run drivers, the labor cost was becoming unsustainable.

And, another issue that Unilever Konya HPC Factory faced was a mass of materials in the production area, disorderly buffer, and high buffer size. With multiple milk run in the same area, it was easy to become disorganized and make stocking mistakes.

Though there is only one production area and one warehouse involved, there were two separate milkrun flows. Each required a different payload and feeding type. Worker skill posed a challenge, as there were several different types of work experience needed in the same area. Due to manual feeding

practices, there was a need for human workers around the clock, leading to high labor costs. High demand posed yet another challenge. Cycle time improvements were necessary, as the long cycle times were impeding productivity.

The aim was to eliminate unproductive, cost-ineffective and unsafe operation flow, replacing them with fully autonomous, safest and the most flexible internal transport. Autonomous mobile robots allow for a safer environment with no forklifts and no human workers needed to transport the material between locations. To maximize safety and efficiency while transporting materials between the warehouse and the production floor, a detailed

engineering study was conducted to determine true robot and attachment selection, proper station and flow structure. Milvus Robotics then designed attachments to perfectly fit to the robot structure and ensured maximum reliability, safety and synchronization together with the robot. After deployment, we continue to provide superior maintenance and support to keep the mobile robots running around the clock.

The first step was to conduct a detailed engineering study that kept costs low while improving cycle times and applying a fully automated solution. In this stage, we ran simulations, calculated the exact number of robots needed, and determined the best layout so that the robots could work in harmony in a fully automated way. Call-off times, amount of carried materials and line side buffer size were determined by the engineering study. Delivery stations had to be positioned in a way to create optimized paths for the robots, improving workflow and productivity. A new supermarket area acted as a preparation point for robots as they went back and forth between the warehouse and the production area. This created a physical layer between robot distribution area and warehouse forklift operation area while defining and addressing pick-up and delivery points to create a fully trackable solution. This concentrated the manual labor needs into a single point,

providing one-time delivery structure and automatic feeding, thus optimizing the operator working cycle and ergonomics. We designed custom tools and equipment for the automatic feeding of transferred material to production machinery, allowing for minimal human workers. When the robot reaches the production area, materials can be loaded directly and immediately with the help of sensory equipment. This prevents excess materials in the production area while optimizing buffer size to have no idle time during production. Robots were designed with automatic charging (self-determining of which robot will be charged among all fleet) and full integration with MRP and WMS systems. They are synchronized with stations for automatic call-off and they provide parallel continuous data synchronization, instantly sharing all steps in the flow.

SEIT500 with Custom Conveyor Attachment

The SEIT500 with custom conveyor attachment and cabinet is responsible for emptying pallet infeed to stack packing material, infeeding full pallets of empty bottles, emptying packing material outfeed, and emptying pallet stack outfeed from the pallet magazine. It provides the ability to carry unstable loads with increased speed and safety compared to traditional conveyors. The cabinet keeps boxes of packing materials secured in perfect alignment and ensures the reliable use of an automatic feeder robotic arm at the line side.

SEIT100 with Pin-Hook Attachment

The small but mighty SEIT100 with pin-hook attachment is designed for moving a detachable cart to transport labels in boxes. It picks up the cart in the supermarket area and delivers it to the line side, allowing operators to retrieve or store boxes ergonomically. The on-demand delivery approach eliminates the need for additional buffer area, simplifying the management of line side delivery.
 

We were impressed with the level of detail put into the engineering study! Milvus approached this project with our needs in mind and offered customizations that allowed for full and total automation in our factory. They did not just provide a general solution. They were always incredibly punctual and communicative. With our input and constant back-and-forth communication, as well as their open mind to new ideas and requests, a completely custom solution was reached.
Atakan Nergiz
Unilever, Engineering Manager