This study has been assigned by Bengt Hellman who works at the logistic department at IKEA Torsvik just outside of Jönköping. The task has been to develop a new picking strategy for the Oversize area in the CDC-Warehouse. The reason why IKEA wants a new strategy is because they want to minimize the route length for the forklifts when collecting the orders. By evaluating the current strategies on other areas in the CDC-storehouse, study literature within this subject and look at restrictions for the storing of goods, we have analyzed how the Oversize area works today. We compared the gathered information, to how it should be done according to the literature to be able to work out a new functional strategy. Today, IKEA does not have a working strategy for the oversize area because of lack of time and because all the power has been put on other areas were sales rates are currently higher. This have led to lack of organisation at the Oversize area and items are just put were there is space without first analysing were it should be placed. The strategy that we have worked out and introduced to IKEA builds on easiness of understanding the layout, the employees shall know why an item is placed where it is. We have also analyzed which items that are frequently ordered with each other. We have put weight on trying to keep those items as close as we can to minimize the route length for the forklifts. To help IKEA with reorganizations in the future we have made it as easy as we could to move high- and low frequently items around and also introducing new articles in the storehouse, this by the reason that sales rate can change drastically when a new sales campaign is initiated by IKEA / Detta examensarbete är utfört på önskemål av Bengt Hellman som arbetar på logistikavdelningen på IKEA Torsvik utanför Jönköping. Arbetet har gått ut på att ta fram ett nytt förslag på hur de skall placera sina artiklar på plocknivå (vad IKEA kallar för mappning) inne på Oversize avdelningen på IKEA:s CDC-lager. Anledningen till detta är att IKEA vill minska sina körsträckor för plockarna inne på lagret och därmed öka effektiviteten. Genom att studera befintliga mappningsstrategier som redan finns på övriga avdelningar på CDC-lagret, litteraturstudier och titta på vilka begränsningar som finns inne på lagret så har vi analyserat nuläget mot teori för att sedan kunna ta fram en ny strategi för hur en fungerande mappning skulle kunna se ut. I dag så finns det inte någon väl utarbetat strategi för mappningen på Oversize avdelningen, detta på grund av att andra avdelningar prioriterats på grund av att de säljer mycket mer i dagsläget. Detta har även medfört att den huvudsakliga uppdelning som fanns tidigare på Oversize avdelningen med affärsområden har fått stå åt sidan på grund av tidsbrist och artiklar har placerats in där det finns plats istället för att analysera var de kan placeras bäst. Det nya förslaget som vi presenterar för IKEA bygger på att det skall vara enkelt att förstå layouten, plockarna skall veta varför en artikel finns där den finns. Vi har även tagit stor hänsyn till vad som säljs med vad och försökt placera dessa artiklar i närheten av varandra för att på så sätt minska körsträckorna. Vi har även haft i åtanke att det skall vara enkelt att placera om hög och lågfrekventa artiklar samt nyheter inne på lagret då försäljningsvolym påverkas väldigt mycket utav olika kampanjer som IKEA har.

在資產管理公司的全球化浪潮下，國內資產管理的規模大幅成長，其商品種類也不斷地推陳出新，而投資人再選取商品上，經由過去的文獻發現投資人自身在判斷一檔基金投資與否通常會看其過去的績效，在近期有較高績效的共同基金較會受到投資人青睞。故在投資人有這種追求過去歷史績效的現象時，如何選擇有績效持續性的共同基金就變成一個重要的議題。 而一直以來，基金績效持續性的探討所找到的結果各家看法不一，部分文獻顯示出基金績效的持續性非來自於基金經理人的強調選股特徵，而亦有學者認為基金經理人可能會有能力上或是訊息上的優勢。經由歸納，常發現已發展國家的股票型基金持續性是不顯著的，而新興國家可能由於經理人的資訊程度較大眾的消息取得容易且迅速。 本文經由探討台灣股票型基金發現擁有較好強調選股特徵(1-R2)的基金其在未來績效較有持續性，若再搭配當期α來考量，則短期，投資強調選股特徵弱但α大的群組或是投資強調選股特徵強但α小的群組，績效表現較好；然而，若放眼長期，擇投資強調選股特徵強的基金，績效表現會較為出色，尤其是α落在較大群族的基金。整體而言，淨資產對於持續性的影響是顯著負向的，可能原因為規模不經濟導致；週轉率越高代表其績效持續性較強。另外新資金湧入導致基金績效持續性較不佳，原因可能為其淨資金流入會造成基金操作管理上效率的問題。 / Under the globalization tide of the asset management company, the asset managed in Taiwan has been grown dramatically, and much more various products have been launched. Empirical evidence found that investors tend to take past performance into consideration before they invest in funds. As a consequence, funds with recent outstanding performance are more popular than others. So performance persistence becomes an important issue. Empirical researches did not reach consensus on whether funds have performance persistence, some paper shows that performance persistence does not stem from stock picking ability, however, some evidence show that fund managers might have some information or ability advantages. And performance persistence is more likely happened in emerging countries than developed countries due to fund managers have more efficient and latest information than general investors. This paper finds that Taiwanese stock fund which emphasize more on stock picking ability (higher 1-R2) tend to persist. If analyzed with current α, funds with less emphasis on stock picking and bigger current α in the short run, or funds with more emphasis and weaker α will have better performance in the future. In the long run, more emphasis on stock picking, better performance in the future，especially those with strongerα. Greater asset under management and net sales rate might cause worse performance persistence due to inefficiency in management. And higher turnover help performance persistence.

Syftet: Syftet med denna studie är att kartlägga belastningsergonomiska risker i ett framtida internt logistikflöde, samt att ge förslag på hur dessa risker kan undvikas genom tillämpning av LEAN metodik och en ny logistiklösning. Följande frågeställningar har ställts för att identifiera orsaker till problem och förbättringsmöjligheter: 1)    Vilka arbetsmoment i det studerade logistikflödet leder till ergonomiska risker? 2)    Hur kan fallstudieföretaget införa LEAN metodik för att uppnå bättre ergonomi vid materialhantering? 3)    Hur kan en ny generell och mer ergonomisk logistiklösning för materialhantering se ut på fallstudieföretaget? Metod: Studien har genomförts baserat på en fallstudie på ett industriföretag. Data har samlats in genom intervjuer och observationer på fallstudieföretaget, studiebesök på två andra industriföretag samt genom en litteraturstudie. För att identifiera och bedöma olika ergonomiska risker har verktyget RAMP tillämpats. Studiens resultat: Studien resulterade i en ergonomisk kartläggning för ett utvalt internt logistikflöde med förslag på hur bättre ergonomi kan uppnås i fallstudieföretagets material-hantering. Den ergonomiska kartläggningen påvisade att flera arbetsmoment innebär en ökad risk för att personalen utvecklar belastningsbesvär. Många tunga lyft, skjuta- och dra arbete samt olämpliga arbetsställningar visades ha störst negativ inverkan på ergonomin. För att minska dessa risker utan större förändringar av nuvarande fabrikslayout och befintligt arbetsflöde kan bland annat arbetsrotation, olika hjälpmedel och modifieringar av teknisk utrustning införas. Förslag presenteras också på hur en ny och mer ergonomisk materialhanteringslösning kan se ut på fallstudieföretaget genom införande av en omplockningsstation och en supermarket. Även ett förslaget ramverk presenteras för hur fallstudieföretaget kan arbeta genom LEAN-metodik i syfte att uppnå en bättre ergonomi i materialhanteringen. Slutsats: Den ergonomiska kartläggningen indikerade att förbättringsåtgärder krävs för att personal inte ska riskera att utveckla belastningsbesvär och förslag har tagits fram för hur den ergonomiska situationen kan förbättras. Rekommendationer: Fallstudieföretaget rekommenderas att vidta åtgärder för de ergonomiska risker som har identifierats. Innan de föreslagna förbättringarna fullföljs krävs vidare studier för att utvärdera förbättringsförslagen ur andra än ergonomiska aspekter samt genomförande av RAMP-analys. Fallstudieföretaget rekommenderas även att undersöka möjligheten att införa det föreslagna LEAN-ramverket i syfte att skapa förutsättningar för en god ergonomisk situation. Nyckelord: Belastningsergonomi, RAMP, Omplockningsstation, Arbetsmiljö, Intern logistik, Materialhantering / Purpose: The purpose of this study is firstly to identify risks of ergonomic strain in a future internal logistics flow and secondly propose how to avoid these risks by applying LEAN methodology and a new logistics solution. In order to identify causes for problems and to find improvement opportunities the following issues have been addressed: 1)    What tasks in the studied logistics flow lead to risks of ergonomic strain? 2)    How can the studied company implement the LEAN methodology to improve ergonomics in the material handling? 3)    How can a new general and more ergonomic logistic solution for material handling look like for the studied company? Method: The study has been conducted based on a case at an industrial company. Data has been collected through interviews and observations at the company, visits at two other industries and through a literature survey. To identify and assess various ergonomic risks, the RAMP tool has been applied. Study result: The study resulted in an ergonomic survey for a selected internal logistics flow with suggestions on how to improve ergonomics in the studied company´s material handling. The ergonomic survey showed that several work tasks cause an increased risk for the operators to develop strain injuries and therefore improvements are required. Heavy lifting, pulling and sliding work pieces and incorrect working positions were shown to have the most adverse impact on good ergonomics. To reduce these risks - without major changes to the current factory layout and existing workflow - work rotation, various tools/aids and modifications of technical equip-ment can be implemented. Proposals are presented on how a new and more ergonomic material handling solution can be achieved at the studied company through the introduction of a pickup station and a “supermarket”. A suggested framework is also presented for how the company can use LEAN methodology in order to achieve better ergonomics in the material handling process. Conclusion: The ergonomic survey indicated that improvements are required in order not to risk strain injuries for the operators. Suggestions have been made for how the ergonomic situation can be improved. Recommendations: The studied company is recommended to take measures with respect to the ergonomic risks identified. Before the proposed improvements can be introduced, studies are required to evaluate the improvement proposals from other than ergonomic aspects as well as performing a RAMP analysis. The studied company is also recommended to investigate the possibility of introducing the proposed LEAN framework. Keywords: Strain ergonomics, RAMP, Picking station, Work environment, Internal logistics, Material handling

Uppsatsen undersöker hur Emballator Växjöplast prioriterar och resonerar kring aspekterna volymutnyttjande, plocktid, säkerhet, kapitalbindning och servicenivå vid optimering av deras färdigvarulager. Författarna kom fram till följande slutsats: Fallföretaget prioriterar säkerhet högst för att skydda individen Servicenivå prioriteras efter säkerhet då de arbetar kundfokuserat. Efter servicenivå prioriteras volymutnyttjande för att minska sin externlagring. Plocktid prioriteras efter volymutnyttjande där målsättningen är att undvika nyanställningar. Sist prioriteras kapitalbindning då denna inte är fokus för logistikfunktionen.   Vidare undersöker författarna hur en multi-criteria optimization av aspekterna vid optimering av färdigvarulagret kan gå till. Författarna kommer fram till följande slutsatser: The main criteria method är bäst lämpad optimeringsmetod. Volymutnyttjande ska minimeras givet att resterande aspekter uppfyller respektive bivillkor. De flesta förvaringsmetoder och artikelplaceringar uppfyller aspekternas bivillkor Bäst lämpad förvaringsmetod och artikelplacering grundas därför på vilken som möjliggör bäst volymutnyttjande. Slutligen utvärderas Emballator Växjöplasts nuvarande färdigvarulager sett till aspekterna utifrån analysen för frågeställning 2. Här presenteras även kortsiktiga och långsiktiga förbättringsförslag. Författarna kom fram till följande slutsats: Deras nuvarande förpackning, förvaringsmetod samt artikelplacering tillgodoser respektive bivillkor men kan förbättras sett till the main criteria, volymutnyttjande. Ett kortsiktigt förbättringsförslag genom att utföra en liknande artikelplacering på bättre sätt kan upp till 38-57 fler pallar rymmas på färdigvarulagret. Ett långsiktigt förbättringsförslag genom att kombinera traditionella pallställage och drive-through eller push-back-hyllor, kan totala antal pallplatser på färdigvarulagret öka med 18,4 %. / The essay examines how Emballator Växjöplast prioritize and reason among the aspects safety, service level, utilization rate, order picking time and capital tied up in inventory when optimizing their finished goods warehouse. The authors came to the following conclusion: Firstly, they prioritize safety the highest to protect the individuals within the warehouse. Service level is prioritized secondly because they operate with a customer focus. After service level utilization rate is prioritized to lower their need for external storage. Order picking time is prioritized after utilization rate with the goal to avoid the need for employing more operators within the warehouse. Lastly capital tied up in inventory is prioritized because the aspect is not in focus for the logistics department.   Moreover, the authors investigate how multi-criteria optimization as an optimization method can be used when optimizing a finished goods warehouse considering several contradictive aspects and the conclusion is: The main criteria method is best suited in optimization method. Utilization rate is the main criteria and the other aspects are constraints. The majority of storage systems and storage assignment policy are within the constraints. The best storage systems and storage assignment policy is therefore mainly determined by the main criteria.   Lastly a discussion regarding the finished goods warehouse is held and both short term and long term improvements regarding the aspects are presented. The conclusions made by the authors are as follows: Their current packaging, storage systems and storage assignment policy is sufficient in terms of the different constraints but the main criteria can be improved. Short term improvements are to use a similar storage assignment policy in a better way and enable room for 38-57 more pallets in the finished goods warehouse. Long term improvements are to improve both storage assignment policy and the storage system. By combining traditional racks with some other storage system such as drive-through or push-back-shelves the number of pallets that can fit within the warehouse can increase by 18,4%.

Today modern industry systems are almost fully automated. The high requirements regarding speed, flexibility, precision and reliability makes it in some cases very difficult to create. One of the most willingly researched solution to solve many processes without human influence is bin-picking. Bin picking is a very complex process which integrates devices such as: robotic grasping arm, vision system, collision avoidance algorithms and many others. This paper describes the creation of a vision system - the most important part of the whole bin-picking system. Authors propose a model-based solution for estimating a best pick-up candidate position and orientation. In this method database is created from 3D CAD model, compared with processed image from the 3D scanner. Paper widely describes database creation from 3D STL model, Sick IVP 3D scanner configuration and creation of the comparing algorithm based on autocorrelation function and morphological operators. The results shows that proposed solution is universal, time efficient, robust and gives opportunities for further work. / +4915782529118

Just how far is it possible to make learning of new parts for recognition and robot picking autonomous? This thesis initially gives the prerequisites for the steps in learning and calibration that are to be automated. Among these tasks are to select a suitable part model from numerous candidates with the help of a new part segmenter, as well as computing the spatial extent of this part, facilitating robotic collision handling. Other tasks are to analyze the part model in order to highlight correct and suitable edge segments for increasing pattern matching certainty, and to choose appropriate acceptance levels for pattern matching. Furthermore, tasks deal with simplifying camera calibration by analyzing the calibration pattern, as well as compensating for differences in perspective at great depth variations, by calculating the centre of perspective of the image. The image processing algorithms created in order to solve the tasks are described and evaluated thoroughly. This thesis shows that simplification of steps of learning and calibration, by the help of advanced image processing, really is possible.

The amount of products sold online is increasing at record speed, which has meant a mixed blessing for e-commerce companies. Continuously increasing demand and a customer base that is discerning, disloyal and expects increasingly shorter lead times impose high logistics demands. One of the major differences between logistics within e-commerce and traditional store replenishment, which has a major impact on logistical requirements, is that e-commerce orders are more labour intensive. This is because e-commerce orders often consists of a few orderliness containing only a few pieces per line, which means that e-commerce companies has to pick, pack and ship thousands of orders in small packages of piece picked products. The increased demand and high logistical requirements within the e-commerce industry has resulted in that many of the warehouses that previously have managed well with manual labour feel the need to invest in warehouse automation to ensure capacity for continued growth. However, the decision to automate can be very complicated since automation often requires a high capital investment and it can therefore take a long time before the investment becomes profitable.  A calculation, that may be difficult to perform due to the many different financial factors that need to be taken into account, has to be performed before a decision can be made. There are also qualitative factors, that can be difficult to motivate economically but which can be crucial to consider in an automation decision. Lyko Group AB, one of Scandinavia’s largest actors within beauty and haircare, has for many years been heavily growing and forecasts to continuously do so during the upcoming years. Lyko Group AB has identified a need to invest in automation solutions in their warehouse to ensure that they have capacity to meet demand. In order to facilitate the automation decision, this study presents a model aims at comparing and generation decision making support on the profitability of various alternative automation solutions for high-intensity piece picking at a warehouse. A theoretical model, consisting of capacity requirements, qualitative- and quantative factors, was created based on a literature study. The model was tested through an application on Lyko Group AB and later modified based on the experience gained during the application, resulting in a reality-based model. The resulting model is iterative and enables multi-step feedback to the suppliers by identifing in which areas the performance of the different solutions differ.

This thesis is a literature study on how existing research on embodied tool use may support the use of the use of the computer mouse within three dimensional environments, followed by an analysis of a typical scenario in the use of three dimensional environment. Problems with interaction in this domain are well known to designers of 3d programs but not well understood, which results in programs in which mouse controllers are used to control three dimensional objects being more difficult to learn and less efficient to use than would be possible if the interaction was better understood. The problems are often identified by their symptoms, such as the drag-threshold problem, picking problem, and the object rotation/viewpoint management problem, but this thesis will explore what the cause of those problems is, and identifies them all as a single cognitive problem which is found to be caused by a rift between the functioning of the two dimensional tool in use (the mouse and cursor) and the simulated three dimensional environment with which the cursor is interacting. Analyses are performed on a scenario, and result in a pinpointing of the problem and possible solutions to the interaction part of the problem (with design guidelines emerging), as well as finding the possibility that the cognitive roots of the problem result from an incompatibility between body-schema frames of reference for movement between the two dimensional parts of the action and the three dimensional part of the action.

Un pointé précis des temps de premières arrivées sismiques joue un rôle important dans de nombreuses études d’imagerie sismique. Un nouvel algorithme adaptif est développé combinant trois approches associant l’utilisation de fenêtres multiples imbriquées, l’estimation des propriétés statistiques d’ordre supérieur et le critère d’information d’Akaike. L’algorithme a l’avantage d’intégrer plusieurs propriétés (l’énergie, la gaussianité, et la stationnarité) dévoilant la présence des premières arrivées. Tandis que les incertitudes de pointés ont, dans certains cas, d’importance équivalente aux pointés eux-mêmes, l’algorithme fournit aussi automatiquement une estimation sur leur incertitudes. La précision et la fiabilité de cet algorithme sont évaluées en comparant les résultats issus de ce dernier avec ceux provenant d’un pointé manuel, ainsi que d’autres pointeurs automatiques. Cet algorithme est simple à mettre en œuvre et ne nécessite pas de grandes performances informatiques. Cependant, la présence de bruit dans les données peut en dégrader la performance. Une double sommation dans le domaine temporel est alors proposée afin d’améliorer la détectabilité des premières arrivées. Ce processus est fondé sur un principe clé : la ressemblance locale entre les traces stackées. Les résultats montrent l’intérêt qu’il y a à appliquer cette sommation avant de réaliser le pointé automatique. / Accurate picking of first arrival times plays an important role in many seismic studies, particularly in seismic tomography and reservoirs or aquifers monitoring. A new adaptive algorithm has been developed based on combining three picking methods (Multi-Nested Windows, Higher Order Statistics and Akaike Information Criterion). It exploits the benefits of integrating three properties (energy, gaussianity, and stationarity), which reveal the presence of first arrivals. Since time uncertainties estimating is of crucial importance for seismic tomography, the developed algorithm provides automatically the associated errors of picked arrival times. The comparison of resulting arrival times with those picked manually, and with other algorithms of automatic picking, demonstrates the reliable performance of this algorithm. It is nearly a parameter-free algorithm, which is straightforward to implement and demands low computational resources. However, high noise level in the seismic records declines the efficiency of the developed algorithm. To improve the signal-to-noise ratio of first arrivals, and thereby to increase their detectability, double stacking in the time domain has been proposed. This approach is based on the key principle of the local similarity of stacked traces. The results demonstrate the feasibility of applying the double stacking before the automatic picking.

Warehouse automation is a measure E-commerce companies can take to get a more streamlined flow through their warehouse. Order picking is the most labor intensive task in a warehouse. By automating the order picking process companies can lower their costs and improve their response times. This thesis studies the A-frame, an automated order picking system, at a large online pharmacy, Apotea AB. An A-frame has dispensing channels on its side and a conveyor belt that runs through the entire machine. Products for an order are ejected from the channels onto the conveyor belt and at the end of the machine they are dropped into a box. The box is then sealed, labeled and sent to the customer. For the automatic flow to function correctly, all orders picked by the A-frame need to be complete orders. Complete orders are orders where there are no products missing. To maximize the throughput of the A-frame, an appropriate product allocation will be required. Due to the vast number of combinations, it is extremely difficult to identify an optimal product allocation. This study has examined three different approaches to the product allocation problem for an A-frame. The first two methods are based on ranking the products depending on their quantities sold. The last method uses association rule learning, which is a machine learning technique for finding interesting patterns in a data set. Association rule learning was used to find which products were associated to each other. These associations were then placed in a graph structure and solved using a heuristic. To evaluate the different allocation methods, a simulation model was created. The A-frame was simulated using a discrete event simulation, which meant all methods could be tested on the same data to correctly compare the performance of each allocation. The study showed that the heuristic using association rules gave the highest number of picks for the tested period. However, it was only marginally better than the method that first removed orders that could not be picked from the A-frame and then ranked all products by their quantities sold. The study's conclusion is that while association rule learning resulted in the highest number of picked orders, the gain of using it does not motivate its complexity. Instead a more simple approach by ranking products by their quantities sold should be used. Warehousing in the era of E-commerce has to be fast, correct and cheap.