Keymed Invests in Vertical Lift Technology

Formed in 1970, KeyMed has grown from a staff of four to become firmly established as an international leader in the manufacture and supply of specialised medical and industrial equipment. Today, the KeyMed Group employs approaching 1,000 people at its purpose-built headquarters in Southend-on-Sea, Essex. KeyMed is one of the global business centres for Olympus endoscopy products; it is the exclusive distributor and service centre for the entire Olympus range of flexible and rigid endoscopes, accessories and ancillary products in Great Britain.

Due to the increase in production at their site in South-end-on-Sea, Keymed had run out of storage space in their electrically controlled surface mount facility. With a substantial increase in production forecasted they required a solution that would enable them to stay within the same building, but allow them greater storage capacity for the Reels of components and IC Sticks used in this process. It was clear that conventional methods of storage, such standard racking and shelving, could not deliver on these requirements; Keymed therefore chose to install an automated storage system.

After researching the Automated Storage Market and visiting our existing customer GlaxoSmithKline production facility in Dartford, IAS Industore was chosen against all competition to provide the solution.

After conducting a site survey and discussing the customer's requirements in more depth, IAS Industore specified an ESD protected Lean Lift to fit within a limited envelop to completely utilise the 5.5 metres of height available in this area. IAS Industore was able to provide adequate room for their current requirement but also provide an additional 60% of expansion space.

A key element of this project was the customer's software requirements which was the need for the software to integrate with their bar code reading equipment. IAS Industore was able to write bespoke software aligned directly with these requirements. This, in turn, allowed IAS Industore to supply a fully automated picking process facilitating the "Goods to Man Principle" and utilising the Lean-Lift’s "Pick to Light System".

Commenting on the implementation of the Hänel Lean Lift, Mr Ed Lee, Manufacturing Engineer at KeyMed said, “Our goal was to provide adequate storage for our requirements both for now and in the future, being able to speed up the picking whist improving accuracy in a machine that was EDS Protected was a real bonus.

“We chose IAS because were happy with the way they handled our enquiry and the Lean Lift because we were impressed with the build quality and software solution.”