Coca-Cola Enterprises saves £1.7m using Lanner's Predictive Simulation Software

Having announced its intention to double UK revenues from £2bn to £4bn, Coca-Cola Enterprises required their Northampton, UK, bottling and distribution centre to rapidly plan and execute a cost effective increase in throughput and turnaround time. An internal project team was set up by Coca-Cola Enterprises to work with Lanner to deliver on this objective with an underpinning digital strategy.

Predictive models developed in Lanner's WITNESS Horizon software were used to analyse traffic flow, shift patterns and truck load configurations during operating cycles. Understanding the existing business operations in greater detail was a key element of the operational excellence project, surfacing many insights into how best space could be utilised and focusing improvement budgets on the most impactful areas. Improvement ideas and options were then implemented in the virtual world to test and analyse their effectiveness, risk free, before any commitments were made in the real world.

Having anaylsed simulations of our existing operations, we [Coca-Cola Enterprises] were able to identify key bottlenecks and design an optimum mix of lanes, bays and parking spaces for the distribution centre to cope with extra volume and in the process, reduce operating costs by £1.7m.

“We did try to work out how to maximise throughput efficiency using existing site data, but we quickly determined this was not relevant to the specifics of this location,” he said. "Lanner spent around five months with us from start to finish. The predictive digital twin consumed all the live data from the previous year and was able to look at how the site was running hour by hour every day. This allowed us to accurately assess where we could make things more efficient."“We have started to make plans to extend the site next year and will definitely use the solution again.”

This extract was taken from an article published by Computing.co.uk. Read the full article here (requires subscription): https://www.computing.co.uk/ctg/news/1895962/coca-cola-saves-gbp17m-simulation-software