Warehouse and distribution teams that handle EV battery packs face the same constraint that stopped Stellantis lines. A pack can be on hand and still be the wrong configuration for the vehicles scheduled to ship. The pause at Sochaux and Rennes in late October was driven by limited availability of the specific long-range packs those plants required, not by an absence of batteries in the network. Lea Malloy, vice president of EV Battery Solutions at Cox Automotive, said in wri

The loading dock is where heavier equipment, tighter labor pools and multi-shift schedules meet the same fixed opening. Mechanical levelers that once matched the trucks and people on site now require operators to bend and pull a chain to release a deck whose rated capacity has increased. Not every operator can still do that consistently across a shift. At the same time, electric forklifts place higher point loads on the lip hinge than the equipment the leveler was originally

Warehouse operators entered the week with developments spanning network expansion, automation, consolidation and an increasingly physical form of supply chain risk. Walmart is considering another enormous fulfillment investment, Ocado has taken its automation platform into a major Asian market, DP World is expanding its warehouse footprint, while the latest attack on Wildberries demonstrates that logistics facilities themselves are becoming strategic targets. Here are seven d

A container clears customs at the Port of Los Angeles on Monday morning. The warehouse receiving window 40 miles inland closes at 3 p.m. Wednesday. By Tuesday afternoon, chassis availability tightens, the drayage carrier misses the dispatch...

Lithium-ion forklift battery life is measured in cycles, not hours. Here’s why hours-based promises mislead, and a simple formula to calculate real battery lifetime for your operation. The average human life expectancy in the USA is about 687,000 hours. That number is accurate, but it is also completely useless for estimating your individual lifetime. Car makers don’t warrant engines in years of ownership; they warrant them in miles, because a delivery van and a leisure car c