Warehouse automation in logistics : Case study of Amazon and Ocado
Savushkin, Nikolai (2024)
2024
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024052114014
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024052114014
Tiivistelmä
The logistics industry is undergoing a profound technological transformation from manual labor to automation, driven by innovations like robotics and AI, reshaping operational dynamics. This shift towards automation is crucial for enhancing efficiency, reducing costs, and meeting evolving consumer demands.
This thesis explores warehouse automation and its impact on business performance and employees’ working conditions by conducting a comprehensive analysis of two case studies – Amazon and Ocado. The study aims to address four research questions devoted to the examination of the effect of warehouse automation on business performance and work conditions, and investigate the strategies of Amazon and Ocado to understand the implications of robots in the warehouse industry. The thesis solely focuses on secondary data, obtaining information from EBSCO and Emerald databases from industry reports and online newspapers, and other online media to investigate Amazon and Ocado warehouse automation strategies. The results were analyzed using content analysis and presented in the form of text and tables, then compared with the literature review.
The findings of the study indicate that robotization significantly improves warehouse performance, resulting in higher efficiency, productivity, and faster delivery to anticipate customers’ demands. Robots can take over heavy physical and monotonous tasks which allows employees to focus on more logical and complex activities. On the other hand, it raises a risk of substituting human labor in the warehouse sector, which increases stress and the number of potential injuries at the workplace. The main findings included that both companies benefit from robotization in terms of enhanced productivity and increase of sales, however, they both faced protests from employees, who are not satisfied with the changes due to the risk of losing job and safety concerns. The thesis is concluded with the main findings and recommendations for the academic world and practitioners.
This thesis explores warehouse automation and its impact on business performance and employees’ working conditions by conducting a comprehensive analysis of two case studies – Amazon and Ocado. The study aims to address four research questions devoted to the examination of the effect of warehouse automation on business performance and work conditions, and investigate the strategies of Amazon and Ocado to understand the implications of robots in the warehouse industry. The thesis solely focuses on secondary data, obtaining information from EBSCO and Emerald databases from industry reports and online newspapers, and other online media to investigate Amazon and Ocado warehouse automation strategies. The results were analyzed using content analysis and presented in the form of text and tables, then compared with the literature review.
The findings of the study indicate that robotization significantly improves warehouse performance, resulting in higher efficiency, productivity, and faster delivery to anticipate customers’ demands. Robots can take over heavy physical and monotonous tasks which allows employees to focus on more logical and complex activities. On the other hand, it raises a risk of substituting human labor in the warehouse sector, which increases stress and the number of potential injuries at the workplace. The main findings included that both companies benefit from robotization in terms of enhanced productivity and increase of sales, however, they both faced protests from employees, who are not satisfied with the changes due to the risk of losing job and safety concerns. The thesis is concluded with the main findings and recommendations for the academic world and practitioners.