Koninklijke Auping, one of NPM Capital’s portfolio companies, has won the Netherlands Logistics Award 2016. The Netherlands Association for Logistics Management (Vereniging Logistiek Management) presents this major industry award annually to the most innovative company within this field.
Sustainable production site and innovative supply chain
Auping received the award for the Horizon project, which saw the company completely redesign its production and logistics processes. By making fundamental improvements in its processes, products and corporate culture, the company has created a high-tech, innovative and sustainable supply chain. The members of the judging panel commended Auping for its ability to reinvent itself, as well as lauding the impressive results of the project.
Harry Gruben, Auping’s Operations Director, was presented with the award Thursday night at the Logistics Gala in Rotterdam. ‘I am immensely proud of this award. Our company has invested heavily over the past few years in designing and building a new production facility, as well as in robotisation, new logistics concepts, and sustainability. We now adapt our production processes to customer orders and have learned to work in a much more flexible way, as well as faster and more efficiently. It has helped us reduce our delivery time from ten weeks to less than three weeks. We have also eliminated waste in the company: we have reduced transport by 120,000 kilometres a year, do not waste diesel, and do not generate any particulate matter. This is the joint achievement of all our people, and I am hugely grateful to the Association for Logistics Management for recognising our efforts by presenting us with this prestigious award.’
Major new innovations
The chairman of the judging panel, Jos van Hillegersberg, was fulsome in his praise for Auping: ‘The company has truly managed to reinvent itself through the Horizon project.
The project was characterised by an integrated focus on customers, employees, technology, business cases and the sustainability of the supply chain as a whole. At the same time, the project also shows that even very well-established companies can implement successful, major innovations that are fully supported by their employees. With its high-quality, labour-intensive products that meet customers’ needs, the smart organisation of production and logistics processes – involving a strategic mix of robotisation and IT – combined with Auping’s visionary and inspired ideas about sustainability, this is a project that is sure to lead the way for many other companies.’
About the award
The Netherlands Association for Logistics Management introduced the annual prize with the objective of promoting innovativeness and professionalisation in the Dutch logistics industry. According to the organisation, recipients of the award are sources of inspiration and role models for other companies. Previous award winners include online retailer Wehkamp, IBM, department store chain HEMA, Heineken, entertainment and media company ID&T, and Nike. The award was presented for the thirty-second time in 2016.
For more information about Auping please contact Leonard van Loon at vanloon@npm-capital.com.
