Automated Cold Storage Distribution Centre for a Leading Pharmaceutical Company

At its Ahmedabad facility, a leading pharmaceutical and life sciences company partnered with Addverb to deploy a Four-Way Pallet Shuttle Automated Storage and Retrieval System (ASRS) for temperature-sensitive, finished goods. The system was designed to deliver high-density storage inside a 2–8°C controlled environment, with reliable, accurate pallet handling for a broad pharmaceutical SKU portfolio.

Objective

The company needed an automated cold storage system that could maximize warehouse capacity without compromising the safe handling of temperature-sensitive, finished goods. That meant optimizing vertical space utilization, increasing storage density, and improving throughput while also reducing pilferage and strengthening inventory traceability.

Manual handling was the core constraint. Every human touchpoint in a cold chain environment carries cross-contamination risk, so the solution needed to cut manual intervention wherever possible while still hitting dispatch timelines with accurate, timely pallet retrieval. It also had to support a wide and varying pharmaceutical SKU portfolio without losing throughput or storage density, a combination that rules out most conventional cold storage layouts.

Solutions

Addverb implemented a Four-Way Pallet Shuttle ASRS built to operate inside a 2–8°C controlled cold storage environment. The automated cold storage system holds 816 pallet positions across multiple levels, with Four-Way Pallet Shuttles handling intelligent storage and retrieval based on real-time dispatch requirements. The Warehouse Execution System (WES) orchestrates the movement and execution of these tasks across the system.

The ASRS is designed to accommodate two distinct automated pallet storage configurations, which gives the facility the flexibility to handle varying product loads without sacrificing storage density. By automating pallet movement end to end, the solution removes most of the manual handling that would otherwise be required in a temperature-controlled environment – cutting cross-contamination risk while keeping cold chain operations consistent and repeatable.

Improvement in Key Results (KPIs)

The extensive solution, incorporating a diverse range of robots to automate warehouse tasks, boasts unparalleled and impressive:

Efficient storage and handling of 200–250 pharmaceutical SKUs.

Achieved a throughput of 20 pallets per hour.

Maximized vertical warehouse utilization across 8 storage levels.

Reduced manual handling and human touchpoints, minimizing the risk of cross-contamination.

Products

Our extensive product portfolio helps us design customised solutions for varying industry requirements.

Cruiser 360

4 Way Pallet Shuttle

Concinity

Warehouse Execution

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