Picture Perfect Data, the Leeds-based supply chain analytics business, today (October 6) launches Fettle, an AI-driven warehouse optimisation platform.
Fettle standardises and checks the data from a site’s Warehouse Management System (WMS), time and attendance and other systems before the AI reads it, then turns it into insight managers can act on. Fettle is already live in UK warehouses and is aimed at operations with 100 or more people on the floor.
Fettle also captures work done off-system, a common blind spot. In warehouses Picture Perfect Data has worked in, systems recorded labour utilisation as low as 42 per cent, rising to 65 per cent once that work was counted.
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At another site, 572 hours were lost in a single week between people clocking on and starting their first task. At a third, grouping pick work to cut out avoidable travel lifted pick efficiency by around 37 per cent, without touching the WMS.
Fettle’s command view answers the four questions that determine how well a warehouse is running: Will today’s orders go out on time and in full? Are people being used effectively? Are stock and the building set up to work efficiently? Is the operation delivering at the right cost and margin?
Managers can drill from each answer into the detail behind it, while Albie lets managers ask questions in plain English and see the evidence behind each answer before making a decision.
Steve Coleman, founder and chief executive of Picture Perfect Data, said: “This is sophisticated technology, but it shouldn’t feel sophisticated to use. The benchmark we set ourselves was the iPhone: you shouldn’t need a manual or a data analyst sitting beside you.
“What surprises me is how many sophisticated businesses still rely on people pulling data together in spreadsheets, or lean towards over-complexity. Fettle packages what we have learned about warehouses, supply chains and logistics into an intuitive platform that gets clients to value quicker, without paying for us to start from scratch.”
Fettle has been launched with STROS Partnerships, which developed its name, brand and go-to-market and now takes it to senior operators as a partner.
Ross Eggleton FCILT, founder and managing director of STROS Partnerships and formerly executive group director of logistics, supply chain and technology at Morrisons, said: “I’d have wanted this across my own sites. I always wanted to know in real time how efficient my warehouse was and whether the customer got what we’d promised. The honest answer usually meant somebody pulling three reports together by hand. Fettle lets the AI do the reading, so managers get the answer quickly, can drill into why and spend their time on the decisions. That’s what we look for in any partner.”
