Dublin and Clonmel; Friday, 13th October, 2006: Bulmers Ltd, part of the C&C Group plc in Ireland, has won a prestigious national IT award for a voice enabled warehouse management system provided by Irish company Heavey RF. Bulmers, which has boosted accuracy and productivity at its Clonmel warehouse, won the overall IT Project of the Year at the recent BT Inspired IT Awards.

The Heavey RF system automates a formerly manual process and incorporates sophisticated voice recognition technology which helps warehouse staff speed the process of stock picking. The technology boosted Bulmers’ pick rate by over 30% and has increased customer service and accuracy as a result.

Bulmers markets an extensive portfolio of brand leaders which includes Bulmers Original Cider and Magners. Based in Clonmel since 1935, Bulmers heads up the Groups Alcohol division and is also responsible for the FindlaterGrants Wines business as well as the manufacture and distribution of global brands such as Carolans Irish Cream, Tullamore Dew and Irish Mist. The Bulmers Clonmel facility has approximately 2,000 different product lines or SKUs (Stock Kept Units).

Electronic orders are automatically converted to speech which are directed to the warehouse staff using wireless technology provided by Heavey RF. Heavey RF, which is the direct partner of voice directed work company, Vocollect, develops the software applications locally in Ireland.

“With the significant growth of the Alcohol division we doubled the number of product lines,” commented Donal Ahern, IT Manager, Bulmers. “This was putting pressure on staff to locate stock in a timely and accurate manner. Stock rotation and batch traceability became more difficult so we needed a more efficient system which we found with the Heavey automated voice recognition system.”

“Bulmers is the first live site to implement this technology in the Republic of Ireland,” added Ronan Clinton (Managing Director, Heavey RF). “As well as increasing productivity and accuracy, the system has boosted real time information on stock balances and stock control.”

(L-R) Ronan Clinton, Managing Director, Heavey RF, Jimmy McHugh, IT, Bulmers, Brenda Cronin, IT, Bulmers, Michael Gavin, Warehouse Manager, Bulmers, Donal Ahern, IT Manager, Bulmers, John Hayes, Operations Manager, Bulmers.