AutoStore: Why Multiple Tasks Are Needed
Our neighborhood market, the big-mega outlets, airport security screening, the DMV, and the interstate freeway system in most major metropolitan areas during rush hour traffic all have one thing in common: there are never enough open lanes. To the endeavor of order and process, when the volume of activity is not accounted for, regulating the forward flow to a single line creates what we call in the industry as a bottleneck. Stalled movement feels like being tied up in a straight jacket. One way to think about an AutoStore task how a printer prints. After the print command is launched, bits and bytes received by the printer trigger a series of events. Paper is pulled from the tray, the information is applied to the paper, and the final product is placed on the exit tray. Before any print job is completed, the printer is in a busy state, and can't be used. Any other jobs that need to be printed are waiting in a queue, and begin after the printer has finished printing the job wh...