If robots are taking human jobs, they haven't made much headway in Santa's workshop - or in his supply chain. It turns out that even the most technologically advanced retailers need lots of humans to serve customers. Amazon, arguably the most disruptive force in American retailing, announced last week that it would be hiring 120,000 seasonal workers this year - 20 percent more than last year - and the Seattle giant isn't alone.
In the heart of Amazon country, Nordstrom, Costco and UPS have joined with a team from the University of Washington in Seattle to study solutions to last-mile delivery issues in urban areas. UW's Urban Freight Lab will explore high-impact, low-cost solutions in urban areas where delivery vehicles, bicycles, cars and pedestrians all have to coexist, according to the university.
A drone service delivering blood for transfusions has been launched by the president of Rwanda. The drones are expected to make between 50 and 150 life-saving deliveries a day to remote and inaccessible clinics across the western half of the country, according to Zipline, the company behind the technology.
Challenge: High-volume publisher was experiencing high growth, increasing demand, and a rotating, diminishing workforce. They needed to automate their manual operation to reduce reliance on labor, increase speed and earn substantial shipping discounts.
The UK and Chinese governments have agreed to more than double the number of passenger flights allowed to operate between the two countries, according to transport secretary Chris Grayling.
Bank stocks have been shaken after a steep drop in China's exports made investors worry again about the health of the world's second-largest economy. U.S. stocks gradually recovered most of their losses as safer investments such as utilities traded higher, the Associated Press reported.
Radley Corporation, a global supply chain technology provider, has announced enhancements to its asset tracking software in response to customer driven requirements for a more sophisticated container tracking system for use within the manufacturing industry.
The Internet of Things (IoT) has been widely celebrated as a game-changing technology for field service and maintenance applications because it allows one device to "talk" to another, communicating when a machine or system could potentially degrade or fail. But what if the "breakdown" is occurring not within a facility or a production process, but within the human body?
For the better part of the last decade, Amazon Fresh has been an enigma. Now, with a change to its pricing, Amazon positions Fresh much more favorably, said Keith Anderson, a vice president at Profitero, an e-commerce analytics start-up that works with retailers and consumer brands.
The latest supply-chain news, analysis, trends and tools for executives in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. Learn how pharmaceutical and biotech companies and their suppliers around the world are managing the flow of products across all channels of the enterprise. Experts sound off on forecasting and demand planning, supply-chain visibility, logistics outsourcing, inventory optimization, transportation management, warehouse management, supply-chain security, corporate social responsibility and more.
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