The Keys for Maintaining System Uptime in Material Handling
In this episode of On Time In Full, Tyler Kern spoke with Matt Greene, Vice President of Life Cycle at Designed Conveyor Systems. Greene oversees the company’s 24/7 client support program; operations and maintenance training; spares and warranty customer service, and various lifecycle projects including expansions and retrofits.
Greene discussed various best practices in maintaining system uptime for material handling including an insightful opening into whether to host applications on sight or in the cloud. In discussing the decision-making process to host applications locally or in the cloud Greene noted that although cloud hosting is not new, it has been growing quickly with ever-increasing capabilities.
He continued to discuss the decision-making process which came down to latency problems with cloud hosting. “Typically, what we see is a hundred millisecond threshold. So, how fast do you (clients) need your decisions? And, if it’s faster than a hundred-milliseconds then we say you know you should probably be hosting locally. You probably don’t want to go with a cloud solution.”
What does this mean for somebody who is trying to put in a new material handling system?
In reality, the most frequent need for decisions under a hundred milliseconds comes in playing during scan and sort operations, high-speed sortation of products. Then, it makes sense to host locally. “In most other instances, there is a cloud-based solution that will work with manufacturer’s needs,” stated Greene.
Greene and his colleagues at Designed Conveyor Systems take a consultative approach to meeting client needs when it comes to deciding the best practices in material handling. System downtime is costly so ensuring clients have the right systems in place to meet their specific needs is critical. Listen in to learn more about what factors need to be considered in maintaining your material handling system uptime.
