Table of contents:
Key Criteria for Evaluating WMS Vendors
Why Choose Custom WMS Development?
What Should You Expect from a Custom WMS Provider?
In the dynamic world of warehouse management, businesses are always looking for methods to increase effectiveness, simplify processes, and stay ahead of the competition. For instance, 82% of retailers implement advanced functionality such as real-time inventory visibility and analytics to improve customer service.
To benefit from modern technologies and enhance your warehouse operations with advanced capabilities, you may be thinking about implementing cutting-edge warehouse management system (WMS) software. But with a multitude of options available, it can be overwhelming to determine which vendor is the best fit for your business.
In this blog post, we will briefly describe how incorporating a tailored WMS can boost your current warehouse system and outline the criteria to consider when choosing the best warehouse management system provider.
Key Criteria for Evaluating WMS Vendors
With the help of the right WMS solution provider, you can significantly boost efficiency and productivity throughout your business. The points below will help you assess whether a vendor and its solution is right for your specific business needs.
- System features. Look for a provider that offers robust core WMS capabilities such as receiving, put-away, inventory control, order completion, etc., “out of the box.” Mention that your WMS system should offer in-depth data analysis, reporting, and customizable dashboards to provide insights into warehouse performance. If the system lacks some of the features you need, evaluate how difficult it will be to integrate them.
- Customization options. Since your warehouse may have specific needs, opt for a system that can adapt to your particular workflows and business rules without incurring additional adaptation expenses. A competent WMS provider should be eager to collaborate with you closely to comprehend your unique demands and tailor the system accordingly.
- Scalability and flexibility. Choose a platform that can scale alongside your business. Examine whether a solution can support both your current warehouse operations and your planned expansion, such as new warehouses and increasing order volumes and product lines.
- User-friendliness and UI. Assess the user interface (UI) and overall user experience (UX) of the WMS solution. Choose a system that is intuitive, easy to use and navigate, so your employees can quickly learn how to operate it. This will improve their productivity and decrease errors.
- Customer support and training. Analyze the vendor’s support offerings, including technical assistance, educational opportunities, and continuous upkeep. Find out how quickly they will be able to assist you when needed.
By considering these essential factors, you can evaluate WMS solution providers efficiently and choose a solution that meets your demands and long-term company objectives.
Top 3 WMS Providers
Choosing from top WMS providers helps ensure access to robust features, implementation support, and ongoing product investment over the long term. Based on all of the considerations above, we’ve selected some vendors that provide comprehensive WMS solutions.
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Order Grid – Advanced WMS solution for warehouse automation
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Order Grid specializes in maximizing the automation of all warehouse processes. The system allows you to forecast demand and generate replenishment orders using machine learning. Additionally, the system lets you control inventories remotely and provide advanced navigation by establishing effective picking routes within your warehouse.
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NetSuite WMS – Cloud-based WMS to streamline warehouse and manufacturing operations
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NetSuite WMS is a cloud-based solution with capabilities such as inventory management, order fulfillment, labor management, and integration with other Oracle applications. The system supports mobile receiving, mobile picking, mobile RF barcode scanning, and mobile cycle counting.
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Körber – Flexible platform for 3PLs, wholesale distribution, and manufacturing
Körber warehouse management systems offer a flexible and scalable WMS solution for 3PLs, wholesale distribution, and manufacturing. The company provides end-to-end warehouse management capabilities, including inventory control, order fulfillment, labor management, and transportation integration.
You can easily integrate the solution with material handling equipment (MHE), such as mobile robots, ensuring support for all automation levels. Despite all its advantages, the system has a lack of reporting functionality and no card processing capabilities.
While off-the-shelf WMS solutions offer certain benefits, they also have some potential drawbacks. For example, they may lack functionality to cover all your processes or open up security concerns due to limited data ownership. To mitigate these disadvantages, you can consider custom WMS development.
Why Choose Custom WMS Development?
Below, we provide several key reasons why you might opt for a custom-developed WMS over an off-the-shelf solution.
- Focus on business needs. No two warehousing businesses are the same. With custom development, you can build a solution tailored to your unique workflows, integration requirements, equipment, physical restrictions, etc. In this way, you will get functionality customized to your business needs.
- Integration capabilities. One of the main benefits of custom WMS development is the ability to seamlessly integrate with your current company systems, such as ERP, transportation management systems, e-commerce platforms, or other specific systems. So, you can build an interconnected infrastructure with smooth data exchange and real-time system management.
- Security and data privacy. When you choose custom WMS development, the system is entirely under your ownership and control. You may integrate your software with a variety of security solutions, including firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and encryption, to create multiple layers of security against internet crime. Also, you can guarantee prompt security updates while modifying the WMS when company strategy changes.
- Long-term cost-effectiveness. In comparison to off-the-shelf alternatives, custom WMS development has higher initial costs, but it is also more cost-effective in the long run. With custom solutions, you don’t have to pay for features you might not use and avoid excessively high license costs. Additionally, you can modify the system when needed without having to pay a lot for customization or being constrained by license agreements.
- Scalability and future-proofing. With custom WMS development, you get a scalable solution that can grow with your business. You may adapt and improve the system as your warehouse operations expand or change over time to meet new requirements or combine with other systems.
Want to create a top-notch WMS solution to improve your warehouse operations? We’re ready to help!HQSoftware has a team of skilled professionals ready to tackle the project. Let’s talk!
Anna Halias
Business Development Manager
What Should You Expect from a Custom WMS Provider?
To ensure fruitful cooperation and smooth development, it is crucial to consider certain criteria for a custom WMS supplier:
- expertise and experience;
- сonsultative approach;
- modern technology stack;
- user-centric design;
- iterative development;
- quality assurance, support, and maintenance.
Expertise and experience
Your future provider should have an extensive, proven track record in custom software development, particularly in the field of warehouse and distribution environments. You can ask for a list of developed warehouse management systems or any case studies they might have for you to explore.
The vendor should provide you with an experienced WMS provider installation team: developers, QA engineers, project managers, and domain experts who understand the intricacies of warehouse operations and possess the technical skills required for successful WMS development.
Consultative approach
Rather than just pushing standard features, a reputable WMS provider will take the time to understand your business procedures and warehouse operations. Only then can the supplier offer customized solutions that effectively address your specific challenges.
HQSoftware experts not only gather project requirements but also thoroughly investigate your working processes to provide the most effective solution options. We aim at saving your resources while delivering high-quality results, so if we think that some features may be redundant, we will be sure to explain that fully and suggest alternatives.
Modern technology stack
Choosing a modern tech stack sets the custom WMS up for future scalability, integrations, and harnessing new technologies. With data lakes, serverless computing, etc., you can integrate advanced analytics and take advantage of AI or ML for deeper understanding of warehouse operations over time.
In addition, modern tech stacks are optimized for delivering responsive UX and handling large data volumes from IoT/sensors.
User-centric design
User experience (UX) is a primary concern in WMS development, as the system should be intuitive and simple to use. So, the supplier should put a high priority on user-centric design concepts.
As your warehouse personnel understand the specifics of daily tasks, consider involving them in the interface development process. They can assess the software’s usability and provide feedback on improvements critical to them.
Iterative development
An agile approach, with frequent testing and feedback, allows a team to continuously improve the WMS solution. Instead of attempting to build the entire system in one go, the development process is divided into smaller iterations, called sprints.
This approach enables the development team to identify and mitigate bugs and risks early on, as well as incorporate user feedback and adjust the system based on evolving business needs.
Quality assurance, support, and maintenance
To guarantee the dependability and stability of the customized solution, a respectable WMS provider must have effective testing and quality assurance procedures. User acceptability testing, integration testing, and unit testing must be performed at different phases of development.
Ongoing support and maintenance services have to include frequent bug fixes and quality enhancements. An excellent option is if your vendor can offer reliable support services to address any issues, provide timely bug fixes, and create system enhancements as needed.
By outlining these requirements for your future WMS provider, you’ll have every opportunity to get a solution that meets your unique warehouse management requirements.
HQSoftware’s Custom WMS Development Services
Relying on more than 20 years in software development, we have experience in engineering both traditional and innovative warehouse solutions. We always carefully consider your request to deliver the best WMS software, providing a variety of WMS development services:
- Consulting. We can guide you on the WMS development approach and verify compatibility with your current systems. Our experts can also create a roadmap of your project and effectively organize project activities.
- Full-cycle development. We offer end-to-end development services, encompassing conceptualizing and prototyping, programming, testing, cloud deployment, third-party integration, and maintenance.
- Software modifying. If you have a WMS built on outdated technology or lacking modern functionalities, by collaborating with our development team you can rebuild architectures for new technologies or modify code to upgrade your current system.
- System migration. Our experts will create a cloud-based solution if you require software that is remotely accessible or offers automatic software upgrades.
At HQSoftware, we focus on engineering advanced WMS solutions, including stand-alone, cloud-based, WMS as an ERP module, and WMS as a supply chain module. We use Agile methodology, which breaks up complex development processes into two- to four-week sprints to explicitly lay out requirements, evaluate system capabilities, and design creative interfaces.
With us, you have access to cutting-edge technologies such as IoT and AI/ML, as well as tried-and-true best practices for WMS installation. So, with our extensive experience, you can concentrate on expanding your business while we manage the challenges of developing WMS software.
Conclusion
An effective WMS can give your company a competitive edge, allowing you to optimize processes, eliminate human errors, and predict customer demands more effectively. The best option to attain higher levels of operational excellence is to develop a custom WMS that focuses on target business needs.
When selecting a WMS provider, you need to consider several variables to choose the best solution for your company:
- industry expertise;
- scalability and flexibility;
- customization;
- integration capabilities;
- support and training;
- technology and innovation.
We at HQSoftware can develop a custom WMS for you that will open up possibilities for advanced data capture, reporting, and predictive analytics, beyond out-of-the-box options. All of these will drive continuous improvement in your business and help you support your strategic business goals. Get in touch with us to discover the potential of custom solutions in the dynamic field of warehouse management.
Head of Production
To ensure the outstanding quality of HQSoftware’s solutions and services, I took the position of Head of Production and manager of the Quality Assurance department. Turn to me with any questions regarding our tech expertise.
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