Shifting to an automated material handling system: A cost-efficiency analysis within pharmaceutical warehouses in Oman

With demand and cost of pharmaceutical products continually on the rise, it becomes more critical to control its costs of storage and distribution. Pharmaceutical products carry special requirements for safe handling, proper storage and shelf-life monitoring. Failure in any of these areas in the supply chain results in waste of valuable product. Automation of the handling of pharmaceutical products presents a solution for reducing waste, and ensuring safe delivery of product to hospitals and pharmacies. Selecting the proper material handling equipment and systems requires careful analysis. Decisions have to be taken within the regional context, as well as taking into consideration multiple conflicting criteria, such as cost, capacity and flexibility. It is proposed here to research methods for selecting material handling equipment in pharmaceutical warehouses located in Oman, so that multiple operational criteria are met in the most cost-effective manner. The proposed approach centers around the use of methods based on data envelopment analysis (DEA) to rank different alternatives, and assist decision-makers in selecting the most appropriate equipment. The proposed methodology will be applied for potential automation in the medical store of a local hospital.