Kardex is building AutoStore into Alfa Laval spare-parts fulfillment

Kardex is entering Alfa Laval's new Indianapolis distribution center through spare-parts fulfillment, not ecommerce parcel flow. The May 2025 project covers a 324,000-square-foot County Line Commerce facility built to expand North American aftersales service, training, testing, and customer-demand capacity. Alfa Laval has not published its own deployment case study in reviewed material.

The greenfield setting changes the automation story. Kardex says Alfa Laval was moving beyond a traditional two-aisle mini-load process that created capacity pressure and frequent maintenance. In a spare-parts operation, those limits can become service delay when urgent orders compete with routine replenishment.

Alfa Laval serves industrial equipment markets where spare-parts delays can affect uptime. The AutoStore design is built around traceability and service response: FIFO and FEFO rotation, lot traceability, urgent outbound prioritization, and make-to-order workflows. Kardex says the system will support inbound putaway, kitting, order picking, cycle counting, and lot-controlled storage.

Kardex says the system will handle more than 350 bin presentations per hour and receive full operational support for the next 15 years. That support horizon is the sharper signal. Spare-parts automation has to outlast product lifecycle changes, discontinued items, and service peaks; a short-lived automation cell would not match Alfa Laval's aftersales problem.

The relevant Kardex history starts with AutoStore. Kardex became a global AutoStore partner in February 2021 and founded Kardex AS Solutions around that partnership. Kardex Group still brings Remstar vertical lift modules and Mlog integrated systems, but Alfa Laval mainly tests whether Kardex can turn AutoStore specialization into a long-horizon parts-service platform.

The portfolio logic is the difference between storage equipment and parts-service automation. Remstar vertical lift modules fit many floor-space and access-frequency problems, while Kardex positions AutoStore for high-SKU environments where density, throughput, and sequencing all matter. Alfa Laval's lot traceability, FIFO and FEFO rotation, and urgent-order prioritization favor a bin-grid system that can present parts in controlled sequences.

Kardex positions itself as an AutoStore specialist. The company says its dedicated team has implemented more than 80 projects across 18 countries, with more than 200 in-house professionals focused on the platform and published availability claims for its AutoStore offer. Alfa Laval applies that specialization to industrial aftersales, a different profile from apparel, grocery, or ecommerce fulfillment.

The Indianapolis deployment remains contracted project proof until commissioning completes and live operating metrics emerge. The useful metric will be urgent spare-parts orders fulfilled per labor hour or service zone. For now, the 15-year operational support commitment carries more strategic weight than the throughput claim because spare-parts automation must endure across Alfa Laval's long industrial-service cycle.

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