Technology

Of about 807,000 MILES of track worldwide, about 233,000 MILES are electrified. The U.S. freight industry is an $80 BILLION INDUSTRY, according to the Federal Railroad Administration. Source: Association of American Railroads. 1% Percentage of U.S. railroad tracks that are currently used for electrified rail. 140,000 Miles of railroad track that are privately owned by railroads in the U.S., the ...

BY CHRISTIAN DOW, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF MEMBERSHIP AND INDUSTRY LEADERSHIP, MHI If you’re managing a warehouse or distribution center, then you’ve got many questions on your mind. Do I have the products and manpower I need to get all these orders out the door? Are this week’s deliveries still on schedule? Am I meeting my customers’ expectations? Where are my ...

The Role of OpenAI and ChatGPT in Fostering Creative Solutions BY MOHAMMAD MAYYAS, PH.D., STUDENT DAY ORGANIZER, MEMBER OF CICHME, PROFESSOR OF ROBOTICS ENGINEERING AT BOWLING GREEN STATE UNIVERSITY OpenAI, established in December 2015 by a group including Elon Musk and Sam Altman, has become a key player in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). Through a blend of sophisticated machine ...

Executive Viewpoint BY JASON MINGHINI, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, OPERATIONS, KENCO GROUP Back before COVID, our company, Kenco Group, was making investments in robotics and automation. We had an AutoStore Robotics Shuttle system. We had LocusBots. But we were just slowly adopting the technology. With COVID, we learned what many others did: We had to accelerate its use. We had to ...

BY SANDY SMITH The twisting, the bending, the lifting—it’s all part of a typical material handling job. But that job doesn’t have to be done without help. Ergonomic products, particularly those that help an associate lift or position items at the right height to prevent bending, are widely available. Improving the use and understanding of these products is at the ...

BY LINDSEY ROONEY, MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS COORDINATOR, MHI Warehouses have long served as test labs for automation. In 1962, MHI member Demag installed the first automated storage and retrieval system at a book club warehouse in Germany. From there, innovation led to the complex Warehouse Management Systems that rule facilities today. As we careen into the Artificial Intelligence (AI) revolution, warehouse ...

Feature More than ever, companies in material handling and supply chain are prioritizing improvements in worker safety and the overall worker experience. Investing in an arsenal of cutting-edge technology is a major strategy they are employing to keep workers safe, reduce the physical and mental toll of their jobs, transform training and empower workers by giving them a stronger voice ...

Feature Organizations can gain more value from these collaborations when they understand the capabilities and limitations of the technology and of the people who work with it. BY MARY LOU JAY It’s been a milestone year for artificial intelligence (AI), with generative AI technology like ChatGPT, Google’s Bard and Bing Chat capturing the public’s attention and generating a great deal ...

MHI Solutions Community BY CHRISTIAN DOW, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF MEMBERSHIP AND INDUSTRY LEADERSHIP, MHI If warehouse workers are constantly bumping into each other while navigating high-traffic aisles, then hiring more manpower likely would add to the chaos instead of boosting throughput. Likewise, moving into a bigger warehouse, a tremendous undertaking with a hefty cost, is no quick fix for businesses ...

Feature The 11th Annual MHI Innovation Awards’ 12 finalists—four in each of three categories—brought strong competition to ProMat. BY GREG BAER, VICE PRESIDENT OF SALES, MHI Of the hundreds of transformative, game-changing technologies that filled each and every aisle at ProMat, three supply chain and material handling solutions stood out among the 156 entries to MHI’s 11th Annual Innovation Awards ...