Elementor #5731
BMS Case Study
How Socius24 helped BMS to scale their startup fast.
Find out more here: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bms-logistic-services
If you choose to work with Dispatcher WMS, I would recommend Socius24.”
About BMS
BMS is a Belgian company, currently located in Evergem. As a 3PL Logistics Service Provider, focusing mainly on consumer electronics, they’re an omnichannel business, that delivers to B2B customers, other distribution centres, and B2C customers.
Startup February 2024
The Project
The Project went live in February 2024. BMS had spent two years focusing on becoming self-reliant at every level, including, amongst other things, the IT level and the WMS system.
Initially, the WMS had been in the hands of an IT service provider who designed the configuration of the system, with BMS having no input into how things had been set up.
To start off with, BMS simply managed the operational side of the business. But as things progressed, they realised that they wanted more control of the way that the WMS was configured. And because of this, soon after starting the company, they decided to completely redesign the WMS so that it worked in exactly the way they wanted.
Key Challenges
Scalability
BMS needed something that would grow with the company – currently they are building out some automation and working to implement it with their WMS. They also wanted a system that would be able to move to multi-site and multi-client when the business got to that stage.
“Dispatcher WMS steers the operator in each step of the warehouse. So, starting from the goods that enter the warehouse until they are put away into the racks or on the storage locations. And afterwards, for the outbound flow, it helps from picking, to packing, to consolidating certain flows, to shipping everything.
Each step in the entire process is steered by a scanner by an RDT (Radio Data Terminal), then the WMS considers all the necessary priorities so that it can give the most urgent task to the correct person. It’s brilliant.”
Stringent SLAs
BMS needed something that would help them to adhere to very stringent SLAs. Being an omnichannel distributor, their client demands an extremely fast response time. This effectively means that they have a lot of cut offs throughout the day, where each cut off quickly follows the previous one, over multiple shifts, with noticeably short lead times.
“And that's where Dispatcher WMS helps us to set the right priorities and get everything out in time.”
Fast Response Time
BMS needed something that would support the fast response time and versatility that they needed, as well as a system that could cope with an ever-changing environment as the company goes through the startup phase.
“Since the implementation, the warehouse hasn't been the same for more than a month, and everything is moving very fast, so we needed the response times accordingly. Currently, we have a lot of stuff configurable on a user level, where via USP, the business can interact with Dispatcher WMS and change the config without needing us.”
Customer Service Costs
BMS needed a system that would support their after-sales requirements and minimise Customer Service costs.
“We do after-sales support for our client, where we do customer service on the logistical side. By using USP, our customer service department has a very good insight into orders and their status. We give USP access to both our customer services and also to our clients, so they can access the data directly.”
Global Business Challenges
BMS needed something that would help them with current trends and global business challenges.
“Customers as well as clients, are becoming less and less patient. People have tighter budgets, tighter timelines, and everything needs to happen now - and fast. Clients are no longer willing to wait for a month for a change to happen. And that's why speed and this very flexible way of working is so important to us.”
Key Requirements
Solutions Delivered
BMS are using Blue Yonder’s Dispatcher WMS and Socius24’s User Services Portal to support their warehousing operations.
“Providing Dispatcher WMS and our own USP app to such an important Customer as BMS in Europe is a key part of our growth strategy” said Craig Jones, Managing Partner at Socius24.
“We are all really pleased that this has been yet another successful implementation in partnership with the team at BMS”.
BMS implemented Blue Yonder Dispatcher WMS with User Services Portal from Socius24. BMS chose to implement User Services Portal as well as Dispatcher WMS because they required data visibility for their clients, as well as for internal people. They also saw added value in the repacking solution that USP provided.
Because BMS are a 3PL warehousing company, about 95 % of their activities relate to Dispatcher WMS and USP. The systems are also integrated with their route planning software.
Support
During the implementation itself, Socius24 were on site, with four staff members providing support during the go-live weekend. In the weeks immediately after the go-live, Socius24 staff provided support over multiple shifts, so that one of them was always available. Since then, Socius24 have provided remote support and are still consulting at a project level.
Socius24 are also providing 24/7/365 proactive architecture support and monitoring for the AWS cloud solution, the OS, database, and Dispatcher WMS application layer giving BMS peace of mind knowing that any issues that could arise, will be dealt with by the team of dedicated experts.
Customisations
Because of the way that BMS planned to work, they requested additional customisations in the Socius24 User Services Portal App. Making changes in USP is an effective and cost efficient way to gain functionality for the warehouse teams without requiring a WMS customisation.
“Solutions get proposed, they get delivered, we test them, and they are implemented, and we have done quite a lot of changes very efficiently.”
Training
Before the go live, training was delivered on two levels. The key users and the IT personnel were trained by Socius24, and then the BMS team went on to train their operators.
“The whole team got training from Matt and from Gareth. That went very well. It was very clear. And then the end user training is something that we did ourselves.”
What’s next
As part of phase two of the project, Socius24 are now building the interfaces to BMS’ conveyor system and ASRS (Daifuku).
Operational Excellence
They have know-how on an IT level as well as on a logistical level. There is know-how about how processes work and how they should work physically as well.”
Outcome
BMS went live with Dispatcher WMS and USP in February 2024 and by August 2024 were supplying (B2B) about a thousand shops throughout Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg.
They also deal with a B2C flow. The company is aiming to be a multi-site and multi-client operation but currently, as they are still in their startup phase, they only have one client and one site. However, they are already onboarding other clients.
Socius24 helped BMS through their Go-Live and post Go-Live adjustments so that they could reach a stable place in their configuration and systems, even as BMS was going through its startup phase.
“We’ve found that once the system is stable, it stays stable, it doesn't require a lot of attention afterwards. The software provided has lived up to our expectations for reliability, speed, and stability”.
The Last Word...
We asked Dries why businesses would benefit from working with Dispatcher WMS and USP.
BMS have identified the role that Socius24 have played in their WMS project as ‘mission critical’, but because of the way the project was implemented, they also recognise that they are much more independent than they expected to be.
This is an important part of the Socius24 methodology – we will always be there for backup, and for anything else our customers need from us. But we also believe that it’s our job to prepare our customers to be able to run their businesses independently of Socius24.
“Socius24 is not only the service provider that we asked for help, but they were the ones who taught us how to do it ourselves and taught us how to be more self-reliant. So now, it’s more a cooperation on that level and not purely a service provider performing a certain service.”
Download Case Study
If you’ve enjoyed this article, subscribe to our weekly Newsletter
– The World of WMS –
for more of the same great information!
