NHS Supply Chain: Logistics are proud winners at this year’s Logistics Awards

The award recognises the successful opening of a new state-of-the-art facility, NHS Supply Chain Suffolk Park near Bury St Edmunds. This is part of an ambitious transformation and growth strategy designed to deliver benefits and savings back to the NHS, whilst ensuring supply chain resilience during an unprecedented year.

Spanning 147,000 square feet of space, twice that of the existing Bury St Edmunds site, the Suffolk Park regional distribution centre represents a significant investment in the NHS Supply Chain as it gears up for further growth.

The award reflects the agility and innovation NHS Supply Chain and Unipart deployed to design, build, and open the site in May 2020, against the backdrop of the global Covid-19 pandemic. Key to the build was Unipart’s use of digital tools, including Digital Twin deployment, and Augmented and Virtual Reality, which allowed modelling for the new site to take place remotely, without the need for unnecessary travel and in a Covid-Secure manner.

Suffolk Park uses the latest innovative technology to design a fully optimised solution for maximum product integrity as a state-of-the-art medical devices hub. Suffolk Park continues to have a positive impact on the local community both through employment and environmental sustainability initiatives.

Chris Holmes, Supply Chain Director, NHS Supply Chain said: “I would like to thank all the teams that have been involved with this project for all their hard work and dedication to getting this new site opened on time as planned. This is a significant milestone in our transformation journey which aims to continuously improve our service offering for our customers.”

Claire Walters, Chief Commercial Officer, Unipart Logistics said: “It is an honour to be recognised at the Logistics Awards after Covid-19 brought us all such unparalleled challenges this year. I would like to thank the whole team for their tireless dedication, and NHS Supply Chain for their partnership and support. Opening the new Bury site early and using the full range of our digital products demonstrated true flexibility, and ensured that the team really delivered for the NHS at a critical time.”

About the Unipart and NHS Supply Chain partnership

Unipart took over responsibility for the logistics contract for NHS Supply Chain in February 2019 and works closely with SCCL (the management function of NHS Supply Chain). Unipart operates seven Regional Distribution Centres (RDCs), delivering essential medical supplies to all NHS trusts across England, together with a national home delivery service for continence products.

About Unipart Logistics

Unipart Logistics is part of the Unipart Group which today spans Manufacturing, Logistics and Consultancy.

Unipart Logistics provide imaginative and transformational opportunities that go beyond traditional logistics, with unrivalled award-winning environmental and safety credentials. With a focus on delivering experience, innovation and advantage for their customers, who can bring the same to theirs.

Unipart provides a wide range of supply chain services, underpinned by a suite of digital products across multiple markets and sectors including Automotive, Consumer, Health, Technology and Utilities.

Unipart’s services meet the needs of many of the world’s best known and most demanding companies, who rely on them to take their productivity, quality of service and customer satisfaction to a new level. Their approach is to work in partnership with their customers to create a truly bespoke service, ensuring their customers meet their transformational goals, continuously driving business forward in a changing and highly competitive business environment.

Unipart constantly seeks innovative ways of adapting the latest digital technology as part of an approach designed to provide an agile and tailored response to all their customer needs.

Unipart brings visibility and insights required to understand the trends and challenges facing the industry, along with the predictive analytics and machine learning to predict future trends, and the technology to respond with new intelligent services.