Latest news with #GurdipSingh
Forbes
3 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
If Your Warehouse Runs Like Clockwork, You're Doing Something Wrong
Gurdip Singh is Chief Product Officer at Blue Yonder, a leading AI company for end-to-end digital supply chain transformation. The future of logistics depends on intelligently adaptive systems, not rigid rules and mechanistic automation. A decade ago, the media got a peek at the future of warehouses: Amazon's fulfillment center in Tracy, California, where hundreds of robots whizzed around in a silent ballet, shipping 1.5 million orders per day. The warehouse had been transformed into "a machine in constant motion," the magazine declared. The idea that warehouses are (or should be) machines has profoundly shaped the supply chain industry—and not always for the better. Machines, after all, run like clockwork: They don't make decisions or grow, but only rattle along a predetermined path. Supply chain optimization, in this view, meant automating and accelerating preexisting processes; the ultimate goal was "lights-out" warehouses, where autonomous robots would work around the clock in total darkness. Today, only 25% of supply-chain leaders see automation as a top priority; just 4% aspire to fully automate their operations; and a mere 1% expect automation to drive headcount reductions. The warehouses of the future, it turns out, will still need people—and light bulbs, too. The reality is that rigid, mechanistic approaches to warehouse management are too brittle for our complex and volatile world. The supply chains of the future will need to be powered not by clockwork, but by cognition: flexible, intelligent and adaptive systems powered by advanced AI, and grounded in an understanding of the enterprise's evolving needs and capabilities. The Power Of Cognition Automation was supposed to make supply chains more efficient and resilient, shielding companies from labor shortages while helping them bounce back faster from disruptions. But you can't build resilience simply by winding the clockwork tighter. Instead, we as an industry need to enable more creative and intelligent decision making across our operations. That's where cognition comes in. Under this approach, the supply chain is conceived of not as a machine, but as an organic network of shifting demands and resources. By capturing data from across that network, we can use machine learning, generative tools and advanced analytics to surface new insights, enabling both human and machine resources to be dynamically optimized to meet constantly changing operational needs. Why does that matter? Consider five ways a cognitive approach can drive benefits for operators: 1. Prioritizing Trailers: Instead of matching trailers with docks on a first-come, first-served basis, a cognitive approach tracks inventory before it reaches the warehouse, then prioritizes trailers and assigns docks based on where and when specific items will be needed to efficiently fill orders. That simple first-principles thinking at a large, consumer-packaged goods company drove a significant increase in operational efficiency, precision and speed, dramatically reducing the need for inventory to be relocated after delivery. 2. Optimizing Slotting Plans: To boost KPIs such as orders-per-hour or cost-per-case, operators must place high-volume products in accessible slots. Investing time to relocate items based on anticipated order volumes can save hours of subsequent wasted effort, and a cognitive approach can identify, quantify and prioritize those savings, unlocking efficiencies that would otherwise have been missed. 3. Projecting Staffing Needs: Every operator plans ahead when setting work schedules, but with a cognitive approach, leaders can forecast workflows and labor resources in real time, even when dealing with hundreds of workers and fast-changing operational needs. That makes it possible to identify and plug gaps if contractors don't show up for a shift or dynamically match workers with tasks based on their experience levels and unique skillsets. 4. Orchestrating Workflows: As people and robots collaborate, tasks grow more complex: Humans need equipment, robots need supervision inventory needs to be available to enable task completion. Rules-based approaches struggle with multidimensional challenges, but cognitive tools can adapt, learn and generate instantaneous solutions based on task priority and the relative proximity, availability and capabilities of workers and equipment. 5. Resource Swapping: A cognitive approach is inherently inquisitive: It continuously asks, what if a given task were restructured, reprioritized or reassigned to a different person or machine? With a holistic view of organizational needs and resources, cognitive tools strive not simply to accelerate existing processes but to develop new approaches in real time to optimize actions across the entire value chain. For warehouse operators, there's no practical way to achieve all these capabilities simultaneously using mechanistic, rules-based or heuristic methodologies. The time taken to crunch the numbers and optimize a given workflow or resource allocation necessarily takes resources and attention away from other areas, leaving managers constantly rushing but making little forward progress. With cognitive tools—which continuously ingest data from across the supply chain and use predictive machine learning and generative AI to analyze, develop and apply insights in real time—it becomes possible to connect performance with precision and speed across all these areas. Gains made in one area yield insights, both new data and new best practices, that support and accelerate progress in other areas, too. The organization as a whole is more efficient, resilient and intelligent. A People-Powered Revolution Crucially, where mechanistic management strategies seek to remove people from the equation, a cognitive approach values the insights and capabilities of America's 1.8 million warehouse and distribution workers. Using cognitive tools, shift supervisors are empowered to make smarter decisions, maximizing throughput while ensuring that employees are safe and engaged. Individual workers, meanwhile, feel less like cogs in a machine: Their individual skills and experience levels align with the tasks they're assigned, incentivizing them to deliver added value as they go about their workday. Like any business transformation, the shift to cognitive tools will bring some disruption. Many companies will take a trust-but-verify approach, piloting new technologies for specific zones, facilities or product lines before approving them for broader deployment. But the more data, facilities and people you connect to cognitive solutions, the more value those solutions will generate and the more swiftly we'll see such tools spread across the supply chain. The bottom line is that the warehouses of the future won't run like clockwork. They'll be sophisticated cognitive systems: intelligent, flexible and data-driven environments where people and machines work alongside one another to maximize productivity and drive benefits for enterprises and their customers. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
Time of India
12-06-2025
- Time of India
Singapore takes down 1,000 IPs linked to cybercrime
By Gurdip Singh Singapore: Singaporean authorities have taken down more than 1,000 internet protocols (or IPs) believed to have been linked to cybercrimes and based in the city-state, officials said on Wednesday. Officers from the Cybercrime Command under the Criminal Investigation Department of the Singapore Police Force (SPF) worked with the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore (CSA) to take down the IP addresses in the country, the police said in a press release. This was part of a four-month operation across 26 countries led by the global police organisation Interpol and named Operation Secure, it said. The operation against cybercriminal infrastructure was conducted from January to April this year. Law enforcement agencies from 26 countries worked together to locate physical servers which it believed to be perpetuating malicious software (malware) known as "infostealers". The operation involved mapping physical networks and executing targeted takedowns. The global effort led to the taking down of more than 20,000 malicious IP addresses and domains, the press release said. The malware is "designed to secretly infiltrate computer systems and steal sensitive information". The stolen data is then sent to a remote server controlled by the cybercriminals, said the police. It added that the "takedown of the malicious IP addresses and domains linked to the infostealers", ceases the cybercriminal's control over compromised systems and effectively disrupts cross-border criminal syndicates. The police said its active participation in the operation reinforces the force's commitment to safeguarding Singaporeans from increasingly sophisticated cybercrime. The strong engagement with Interpol also reinforces SPF's goal to be a global partner in fighting cybercrime, it said. "We will continue to work with CSA and other like-minded partners to protect Singaporeans and businesses from threats in cyberspace; and will spare no effort to disrupt cyber criminals and their operations," Cybercrime Command Commander and Assistant Commissioner of Police Paul Tay was quoted by Channel News Asia (CNA) as saying.
Time of India
26-04-2025
- Business
- Time of India
DSCI making efforts to build global network of cybersecurity experts
By Gurdip Singh Singapore: Data Security Council of India ( DSCI ) has made efforts to build a global network of cyber security experts, its Chief Executive Vinayak Godse said. DSCI is holding interactions in different parts of the world to see how the Indian cyber security experts can collaborate with others in an effort to build an international network, Godse told PTI, after holding India-Singapore Cyber Security Conclave 2025 here on Friday. "This is our first conclave and we are doing such interaction in other geographies as well with one planned India-US Cyber Security Conclave in San Francisco next week," Godse said. "Similarly, we are going to different parts of the geographies to see how the Indian cyber security experts can collaborate with others in an effort to build an international network," he added. This is one way for cyber security professionals to come together and exchange ideas. It is also how industry can add value and government-to-government engagement, he elaborated. "As such, this conclave is an effort to bring people from cyber security together and see how from the industry system and ecosystem we can add value to what is happening to government-to-government level," said Godse. Cyber security needs a lot of understanding and collaborations of partnerships as these initiatives are not limited to one level but have to be international." We are also learning from each other," he added. Singapore was a starting point today, given that a large number of Indian experts are based here and global corporations have their regional headquarters in the city state as well as in Indian IT hubs such as Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune and others. In May, DSCI will be having the conclave in Dubai and in November it will host a conclave in Riyadh which will have participation from the GCC countries.
