01
Inventory tracking
Each item by location, batch, serial number and expiry, updated by a scan at every move, so stock is known to the bin and not just to the building.
02Operations & finance · WMS
Warehouse management system development.
A warehouse management system knows where every item in the building is, and tells people the best way to put it away, pick it and send it.
We build it to order, around the way you work, or extend and connect the one you already have.
01What it is
In plain words.
A warehouse management system knows where every item in the building is, and tells people the best way to put it away, pick it and send it.
A warehouse run on paper and memory depends on the few people who know where things are. Picking is slow because the route is whatever the picker thinks of, errors are found by the customer, and a stock count closes the building for two days.
A WMS replaces memory with locations and scans. Every movement is recorded as it happens, so the stock on the screen is the stock on the shelf, and the system can direct work in the order that wastes the fewest steps.
02What it includes
Every part, explained.
6 parts. Each can be built by itself; together they are one system.
02
Warehouse operations
Receiving, checking, put-away, replenishment, cycle counting, returns and dispatch as guided tasks on a handheld, each with the fewest taps that will do.
03
Picking and packing
Pick lists built for the layout: by order, by batch, by zone or by wave, in a walking order that makes sense, with a scan to confirm and packing rules for cartons and labels.
04
Stock movement
Transfers between bins, zones and sites, with stock in transit visible and nothing able to be in two places or none.
05
Warehouse analytics
Fill rate, pick accuracy, lines per hour, space used, ageing and slow-moving stock, shown to the people who can act on them.
06
Warehouse automation
Rules that create replenishment and counting tasks on their own, and interfaces to conveyors, sorters, scales, label printers and robots where you have them.
Buy, extend or build?
Buy a WMS if your operation is standard pallet-in, carton-out. Build when your handling is unusual, when the warehouse must follow rules specific to your industry, or when the WMS has to work tightly with an ERP or a production system that packaged products integrate with poorly.
Where intelligence fits
Models are useful in a warehouse for slotting, which is deciding where each item should live so the fastest movers are the easiest to reach, and for predicting workload so shifts can be planned. Both are built as recommendations that a supervisor accepts.
03What it works with
Never on an island.
A system is worth most when it shares its records with the ones beside it.
- Enterprise resource planningAn ERP is the one system that records what a company owns, owes, buys, makes and sells, so every department works from the same numbers.
- Order management systemAn order management system takes every order from every channel and sees it through to delivery, and back again if it is returned.
- Supply chain managementSupply chain software plans and tracks everything between a supplier's dock and a customer's door.
- Point of saleA point-of-sale system is the till: it rings up the sale, takes the payment, and tells the rest of the business what was just sold.
Part of a family
Operations, supply and finance: From purchase order to delivered order to closed books, in one flow.
04How we build it
Five steps, in the open.
- 01
Listen
You describe the work and where it hurts. We look at the systems and the data you have now.
- 02
Specify
A written specification: what the system does, what it does not, what it connects to and how we will know it works. A clear quote before any work starts.
- 03
Build in stages
A working piece at each stage, on real data, so you steer early. The part that matters most comes first.
- 04
Move the data
Existing records mapped, cleaned of duplicates and reconciled against the old system before anything is switched off.
- 05
Hand over
Training, documentation and the keys. Your team can run it, and we keep it working for as long as you want us to.
One set of records underneath
Customers, products, suppliers, people and stock are each defined once. A second system joins the first; it does not start a competing copy.
Runs where you decide
Your own servers, a private cloud or a cloud account that belongs to you. Customer, employee and financial data stays on infrastructure you control.
Yours to keep
You own the code, the data, the configuration and the documentation. There is no licence fee to us and nothing stopping another team from taking it on.
05Questions
Before you ask.
Questions about WMS
Does a custom WMS work with barcode scanners and handhelds?
Yes. It is designed around them: every task is a scan and a confirmation on a handheld or a phone, and the screens are built for gloves and bad light.
What is the difference between a WMS and inventory in an ERP?
An ERP knows how much stock a site has and what it is worth. A WMS knows which bin it is in and directs the people moving it. Small warehouses manage with the first; busy ones need the second.
Can it handle several warehouses?
Yes, with transfers, stock in transit and a combined view across all of them.
Guides
Plain-language guides on the problems this work solves.
- CRM, ERP, HRMS, CDP, PIM, WMS and the rest: thirty business systems explained in plain wordsBusiness systems · 8 min
- Custom software or off-the-shelf: how to decide whether to build, buy or extendBuild or buy · 3 min
- Custom CRM or off-the-shelf CRM: which does your sales team need?CRM · 3 min
- When does a company need a custom ERP?ERP · 3 min
- All 16 guides on this →
Rather talk it through? Tell us the problem in a few lines and a person will answer it.
Ask us →Tell us how the work runs today.
How the work runs today, what the system must do and what it has to connect to. A person reads it and replies honestly about whether to buy, extend or build.
Contact
Hire the
swarm.
Tell us what you want the swarm to do. We'll tell you honestly whether it can — and what it would take.
hello@quantumbeetle.ai