Hardware With “Heart”ware - Festo Expands Its Client-Focused RSC ASEAN Logistics Facility In Singapore

On 6 March 2018, Festo launched its much-awaited RSC ASEAN logistics facility at Tuas West. This new facility is three and a half times bigger than Festo’s previous logistics centre and will enable the company to meet its pledge of 100 percent same-day deliveries to clients within Singapore.

Lee Ee Sian, head of sales cluster, Southeast Asia and Pacific, comments: “At the end of the day, we always place our customers first. We want to ensure that customers get what they require in a timely fashion; the investment in this new facility will give us the capability to fulfil our promises to our clients, thus creating a positive customer experience.”

Likewise, Oliver Ring, senior vice president and head of global logistics, says: “The creation of this facility goes back to our roots in 2003, where we decided that we needed to better harmonise our activities in the Southeast Asian region to support our customers in the future. Thus, we delved into creating a logistics centre as well as providing product configurations for our clients. Looking back, I believe this has been achieved and fulfilled, helping us speed up our business. We have now tripled the size of our building, tripled our throughput capacity and doubled the number of shelf locations, and therefore, we’re prepared for the rapidly growing future of Festo.”

Further, Paul Ho, head of RSC ASEAN Logistics, comments: “This marks a significant milestone in the development of our business. Our new logistics facility is set up for growth—I can imagine that the next seven to ten years’ worth of growth is reflected in the capacity of our new centre. We’re not talking about expansion only in terms of size, but also software. We are now using the latest SAP-enhanced warehouse management system, which enables us to optimise our storage space, thus streamlining our processes and improving productivity.”

Hardware is not Festo management’s only concern—“heart”ware, or serving their clients on-time, in full (OTIF), and taking their needs into account, is at the core of Festo’s operations. To address these concerns, the expanded facility espouses speed as its competitive edge. With new automation technology as a tool to meet distribution targets, RSC ASEAN will be able to position itself as a people-based logistics hub and will work towards establishing itself as an automated world-class warehouse within the next five to ten years.