101 Guide to Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) – UPDATE 2024

02/02/2024

A warehouse management system (WMS) is a software solution that offers a comprehensive view of your inventory and helps you manage your warehouse operations.

It offers a wide range of benefits, from boosting picking accuracy by assigning your warehouse operators the best picking routes to tracking inventory in real time.

What Is a Warehouse Management System (WMS)?

A warehouse management system (WMS) is a software solution designed to help manage inventory and integrate with different technologies, such as barcode scanning, RFID technology, cloud computing and historical data and reporting.

A WMS provides your warehouse operators with full visibility into your inventory while managing warehouse processes from receiving to distribution and data collection.

Consider a WMS as the brain of the warehouse — the supervision and control system that manages the different warehouse operations that take place within the entire facility.

In fact, one of the main strengths of a WMS lies in its ability to integrate with other business management systems, such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Document Management System (DMS) systems, to control or respond to requests that take place along the supply chain.

In addition, a WMS can help you:

Boost inventory accuracy
Monitor your stock levels and item movement, thanks to advanced inventory tracking
Improve your warehouse operators’ efficiency in picking processes, leading to faster order fulfillment and overall customer satisfaction
Generate inventory, order and delivery reports

Warehouse Management System vs. Inventory Management System

While a WMS monitors warehouse processes such as receiving and storing items, picking and packing orders, an inventory management system (IMS) only tracks an accurate record of each SKU in the inventory, regardless of its location.

A WMS uses inventory management strategies, such as ABC classification, to guide warehouse operators on where inventory should be placed. This strategic approach helps optimize the utilization of warehouse space, ensuring that high-demand products are easily accessible.

In addition, a WMS can help your warehouse operator decide which inventory should be sent out first, such as products that are close to their expiration date and help manage labor in the warehouse by tracking employee productivity.

On the other hand, an IMS is a software solution that only tracks stock levels, orders, sales and deliveries, when integrated with point of sale (POS) systems and shipping and logistics systems.

An IMS can also help with demand forecasting to optimize inventory levels by analyzing historical data and monitoring sales trends.

Lastly, another significant distinction between inventory management software and warehouse management software lies in their capacity to integrate with other software solutions.

While inventory management software typically serves as the initial step in warehouse management, it doesn’t necessarily integrate into other warehouse operations.

Warehouse management software, in contrast, easily integrates with various software platforms, such us ERP systems, transportation management software or order management systems, creating a synchronized and interconnected network of processes.

How Does a Warehouse Management System Work?

Here’s a step-by-step overview of how a WMS typically works:

The WMS records goods received by the warehouse operator: When goods arrive at your warehouse, they are logged into the WMS by warehouse operators, who scan barcodes or RFID tags on the SKUs to accurately track each item’s quantity and location and quantity. This also ensures your inventory is updated in real-time and documentation errors are minimized or even eliminated.
The WMS determines where each SKU should be stored: To make this decision, the WMS considers factors such as the item’s size, weight and frequency of use. For example, the WMS will instruct your warehouse operators to place fast-moving items near shipping areas to boost efficiency. Then, the location of each item is logged into the system.
The WMS manages inventory: The WMS keeps track of the quantity, location, and movement of every item in the warehouse. When items are moved, picked, and sold, the inventory data in the WMS is updated in real-time, providing accurate information.
The WMS generates a digital picking list: When an order comes in, the WMS utilizes the stored location data to guide your warehouse pickers along the most efficient path throughout the warehouse to pick the items, reducing the time traveled to pick the correct order.
The WMS updates inventory in real-time: Once an order is picked and packed, the WMS updates the inventory to reflect that the items have been shipped.
The WMS generates reports: The WMS collects data on your warehouse activities, which can be used to generate reports. These reports can provide insights into warehouse operations and help identify areas for improvement in your process, such as optimizing storage space utilization, enhancing picking and packing efficiency, and improving inventory turnover rates.

Why choose TSL and Blue Yonder?

About TSL

Total Solutions Logistics Company Limited (TSL) was established to accompany Vietnamese enterprises to build an integrated logistics network. This will become an ecosystem where all businesses can share, optimize resources as well as improve competitiveness. TSL is constantly innovating in technology and solutions so that businesses and customers can compete in the international market in general and at the regional level in particular. Currently, TSL’s field of activity covers a wide range of industries and crosses many industries, including: 3PLs, Retail, Distribution, Manufacturing, E-commerce, Warehouse, Pharmaceutical, Fashion…

TSL is currently the official partner to distribute and deploy Logistics and Supply Chain solutions in Vietnam: Blue Yonder (formerly JDA) and SOTI – the world’s leading brands. In addition to the Warehouse Management Solution (BY WMS), TSL also distributes and deploys the following solutions: Transport Management System, Content Management System, Demand Forecasting, and Mobile Device Management… Besides, TSL is also an official agent of Honeywell and Zebra in Vietnam, specializing in providing barcode equipment such as barcode printers, scanners, which can be integrated in the production line. And there are consulting services to provide IT infrastructure services up to industry standards.

About Blue Yonder

Blue Yonder (formerly JDA) is a global leader in digital solutions for supply chain and omni-channel commerce. Blue Yonder’s intelligent end-to-end platform enables retailers, manufacturers and logistics providers to optimize business decisions, creating a more profitable supply chain while deliver a seamless and superior experience to their customers.

Blue Yonder has a wealth of experience, expertise and scale in supply chain transformation, proven over 35 years with customers. Moreover, Blue Yonder is still boldly paving the way for an autonomous supply chain for businesses. They continuously invest and develop new innovations and help customers in many fields of manufacturing, logistics and retail… stay ahead of the trends.

Blue Yonder’s Smart Warehouse Management Solution (BY WMS)

Blue Yonder’s warehouse management solution, distributed exclusively by TSL in Vietnam market, has overcome the challenges of traditional IT in management by converging the best standards. First of all, the cooperation with Microsoft through integration on Microsoft Azure has been an important highlight contributing to the added value that the solution brings. It is this partnership that will help customers build a cloud-based ecosystem to optimize system responsiveness, remove the burden of technology cycles, and still ensure system availability.

The solution is applied technology to optimize tasks, ensuring every aspect of the goods management process within the warehouse. Besides, BY WMS is always ready for integration with other management systems of customers through standard APIs such as ERP, DMS, TMS systems… In addition, the system is also capable of integrating with management devices in the warehouse such as barcode scanners, barcode printers, etc.

The process of BY WMS goes from managing the dock & yard when the vehicle arrives, receiving, managing inventory, managing the work of workers via RF equipments and finally managing outbound. At each stage in the warehouse management cycle, BY WMS also has many other advanced automatic features to help the process of finding, transporting, inbound and outbound warehouses that be conducted in a more scientific and optimal way. Which helps to save money, cost, time and labour. This is the result of Blue Yonder’s applications in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) – a competitive advantage over others in the same segment of the market.

Benefits from this system: reduce 50% in annual costs, increase 40% in quantity of goods, improve 100% in inventory accuracy. (Source: According to statistics from more than 841 customers who have deployed BY WMS globally)