A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

Techniques for providing an entity monitoring safety feature in an inventory management system may be described. For example, information that indicates respective locations for a plurality of mobile drive units within an inventory management system may be received. Tracking information may be received from a mobile location unit that is moving within a bounded area around a signal transmitter that is coupled to an entity. The tracking information may include an approximate location of the signal transmitter relative to the mobile location unit. Pathway information may be generated that indicates to the plurality of mobile drive units within the inventory management system to stay outside of a radius distance of the mobile location unit based on the received tracking information. The generated pathway information may be provided to the plurality of mobile drive units to enable safe passage for the entity within the inventory management system.

The invention relates to a method for verifying a value stream along a transport route (TS), in particular along a pipeline or a production line, wherein a plurality of field devices (F), each having at least one sensor (S) and/or actuator for determining and/or monitoring at least one process variable and an electronic unit (EE), are arranged along the transport route (TS) and generate corresponding data (DAT), or for verifying the value stream of at least one product in warehouse stock, wherein a first service platform (SP1) is used, via which a plurality of participant nodes (TK) each with at least one database (DB) have a communication connection to one another according to a distributed ledger or the blockchain technology.

A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

Controlling a conveyor installation of a real warehouse having automated machines and persons that are virtualized in a central computer for storing a virtual model of the conveyor installation having the dimensions of the individual conveyor components and the movement parameters thereof. Images of the objects to be conveyed, automated machines and persons in the conveyor installation are captured by sensors at predefined short time intervals and identified by image recognition, and the positions thereof in the conveyor installation are determined. The virtual model is continuously updated with the identification and position determination of the objects in the central computer such that a virtualized real-time model is generated, and the real conveyor installation is centrally controlled with the aid of the model, where material flow control commands are generated for the real actuators for controlling the conveying movement of the automated machines to avoid endangering the persons.

A warehouse automation system adapted to improve warehouse operating productivity includes a plurality of carts for transporting products within a warehouse and a controller. The controller is adapted to associate a first one of the plurality of carts with a first person and to control the first cart to lead the first person around the warehouse. According to one advantage, the time the first person spends restocking, picking, counting, sorting, moving, and packing product into customer orders and shipments, for example, is reduced.

A device asset management apparatus includes an operating asset state storage which stores an operating asset state representing an asset state of a field device as an operating state, an inventory asset state storage which stores an inventory asset state representing the asset state as an inventory state, an asset state changer configured to change at least one of the operating asset state and the inventory asset state based on at least one of information on a maintenance operation performed to the field device and information on warehousing and releasing of the field device, and an asset state display configured to display the operating asset state and the inventory asset state.