Ceva has won the contract to operate an £8 million national distribution centre for Caterpillar dealership Finning.
The DC houses all of the dealerships engines stock, plus 60,000 separate product lines, for next day delivery to 800 field engineers and 28 UK and Ireland branches. The service partnership replaces an earlier Finning in-house operation based at five separate locations.
The 120,000 sq ft building on the Lakeside Estate at Cannock, Staffordshire incorporates wide-aisle and cantilever racking, floor-level storage and a two tier mezzanine floor accommodating 90 per cent of stock keeping units (SKUs).
Finning will operate Caterpillars Smart Sourcing technology, which assists on-time delivery of parts to the customers specific requirements; Finning UK and Ireland will be the first Caterpillar dealer in Europe to use the resource.
In preparation for the opening of the new distribution centre, Ceva successfully consolidated the stock from the five Finning parts operations into the new facility within five weeks.
Steve Smith, parts operations manager for Finning UK and Ireland, said: The transfer of approximately two millions parts items from numerous storage locations, into one central facility was achieved, while of course retaining the level of service that our customers expect during the transition. This significant investment not only meets the needs of today, but also factors in plenty of capacity for our future growth plans.
