Since its beginnings in 2015, Fuzzy LogX has made a name for itself in the industry as a truly independent warehouse and logistics consultancy. MHD caught up with the ‘Warehouse Wizards’ to discover the full Fuzzy LogX story – and the culture and capabilities that have set it apart from the pack.
The name ‘Fuzzy LogX’ is perhaps one of the most striking, curious, and original of all company names within Australia’s supply chain and logistics space. Although not intended as such by its founder, Bas Schilders, the name is illustrative of the creative paradox that is the consultancy’s calling card.
The breadth of the company’s expertise and capabilities is indeed hard to clearly delineate. The borders are amorphous – fuzzy, even – because there are no limits to what they might do for a customer. Their appetite for innovation and novel approaches is insatiable.
But the second term, ‘LogX’ denotes logical, empirically-tested thought. So, while the name might sound paradoxical, like the greatest paradoxes it points to a truth: Fuzzy LogX is always pushing the boundaries, never sets limits for itself or its customers, and matches a boundless creativity with the most tough-minded and rigorous testing and verification in all its projects.
In actual fact – such implications were somewhat accidental. As a youth in the Netherlands, Bas Schilders acquired the nickname ‘Fuzzy’ because of his impersonations of The Muppets character Fozzie Bear. And it was growing up riding as a passenger with his truckie uncle that sparked his love of all things logistical.
Doubtless, Bas would not object to being termed ‘eccentric’ – he has, among his myriad logistics and warehousing pursuits, also run an online business dedicated to gentlemen’s fashion goods – and when he founded his logistics advisory in 2015, his wife advised him that he might as well lean into his flair for quirky originality. He had always been ‘Fuzzy’ to his mates, and he was doing logistics. But lest he inadvertently box himself in to the category of logistics consulting – one would have thought broad enough already – he opted for ‘Fuzzy LogX’, preferring to keep the ambiguity.
The ‘X’ also stands for the ‘X factor’ – that indefinable and imaginative quality that emerges during the creative process.
Predicating your service on delivering that ‘X factor’ is certainly a bold proposition. But after seven years in business – and success stories with clients as impressive and diverse as Toll, Woolworths, Officeworks, Sigma Healthcare, Sleep Corp, HSY, and GPC – it’s fair to say Fuzzy LogX has earned its right to the name.
But how did this idiosyncratically named company, the brainchild of an agreeably idiosyncratic man, scale to such heights so quickly?
ORIGIN STORY
Bas took a degree in logistics in the Netherlands and in the early 2000s got a job implementing warehouse management systems (WMS). It was a solid grounding, with his responsibilities soon extending to cover everything “within the four walls of a warehouse”. However, after working tirelessly, at frequently odd hours, for a year in the operations side of warehouse management systems, he had had enough. He was burnt-out and having no fun at all.
“I took two weeks off to compose myself and decide what I actually wanted to do,” Bas says. “I came out of that fortnight knowing that the operational side – actually running a site – was not for me. Projects was what I wanted to do.”
Projects provided more of an outlet for his creativity – bringing something into being rather than implementing and operating something pre-existing – and in retrospect might be viewed as early evidence of Bas’s impetus to push boundaries rather than live within them.
Years later, working for Swisslog on projects across Europe, Bas learnt one of the most valuable lessons of his career – the kind of lesson that can only come from what he terms “screwing up big time”.
Working as the lead design engineer, automating a site, he was responsible for all the configuration and testing of a “fairly simple” automated pallet crane and picking setup for a 3PL.
“Before we went live, we tested it, we had set everything up, everything was working. I had ultimate responsibility for final testing and checking.”
The 3PL and their Swedish customer – that had travelled to Belgium two weeks before Christmas to witness their eagerly anticipated automated site go live under Bas’s leadership – arrived early in the morning on-site to meet Bas and a senior consulting colleague. Chairs were put out; hot coffee was poured. This was a big day for Bas, his team, and their customers.
“So, we set the automated system in motion and the first order drops in – success,” Bas begins. “We progressed our demonstration, doing six orders, eight orders, 12 orders – and it was humming along nicely with no issues. But then the Swedish customer turned to us and said, ‘Well, let’s see what this thing can really do. Let’s try 400 orders.’”
Then tragedy struck.
“As soon as we hit the ‘Go’ button, we could just hear the cranes in the background stopping,” Bas recollects. “Literally, everything – the whole system – just stopped. And that is the last thing you ever want to hear at an automated site – especially the first for which you have been charged with direct responsibility for testing, and in front of a customer that has travelled internationally right before Christmas to see all the good work you’ve done for them.”
The system failed because there was an undetected bug in the software, and the bug wasn’t detected because Bas and his colleagues hadn’t done volume testing of the throughput that would actually be required of the site when it was in full flight.
“We tested it for functionality under conditions that didn’t mirror those when fully operational,” Bas says. “Yes, it picked two orders. We never tested the design level of what it was supposed to do.”
The mistake cost Bas and his colleagues four months of intensive work to operate the system until the problem was fixed.
“So, that was a huge learning curve for me. But it taught me two things I’d never forget: you can never test enough, and you never want to be in that situation ever again.”
Flash forward to 2008. Bas and his wife Kim settled in Australia – having earlier travelled down under and enjoying its relaxed pace of life. He worked for nearly three years at Swisslog Australia, and another five at SSI Schaefer Australia – in the latter stint managing the project consulting team. But by 2015, despite rising through the ranks and achieving great professional success, he realised he couldn’t reach his potential – nor his customer’s potential – within the structure of the firm.
“I was juggling lots of projects at once and never felt I could give each customer the proper attention they needed. Furthermore, I was operating within the company’s parameters: I was working on different projects, but always boxed in, as I could only work within the constraints of Schaefer’s offering.”
Finally, Bas decided that he’d had enough, and left the job to ponder his future.
He didn’t have to wait long. A few weeks later, GPC called asking for help with a WCS re-configuration. Informing them that he’d left the company, they nevertheless insisted that he join the project.
It wasn’t planned, but Bas thought, ‘Why not?’ And this would be the first project he took on under his newly created firm Fuzzy LogX.
FUZZY, NOT FLUFFY
While Bas was the original founder of Fuzzy LogX – it wouldn’t be what it is today without Jeffrey Triantafilo, Director – Systems and DC Design.
Having originally studied aerospace engineering, Jeffrey remembers as if it were yesterday the first time he encountered an automated warehouse – in Western Sydney in 2012. “It was love at first sight,” Jeff says.
Ever since Jeff thought about automated warehousing every single day.
He started a business doing warehouse installation work and decided to pursue a Master’s Degree in Business with engineering management and supply chain as his focus. In his final year, his thesis was on building businesses cases for automated warehouses. Jeff was put in touch with Bas at Schaefer, who over the course of two and a half hours gave Jeff a master class on the subject. “I was very grateful, wrote my report, finished my degree [he graduated as Dux] then shortly thereafter was hired as an intralogistics consultant for Dematic.”
Bas and Jeff wouldn’t team up until 2017, after Jeff had done a stint at Dematic. While extremely grateful for his time at Dematic – “One of the best experiences in my life, because I learnt so much” – Jeff says that the style was not for him, and that he was constantly trying to push outside the box of what Dematic (or any vendor for that matter) could offer.
Fortuitously for both Bas and Jeff, Jeff’s first phone call after leaving Dematic was to Bas – whom he knew had started his own consulting business since they last met.
It had been just over a year and a half since Bas had started Fuzzy LogX, and Bas was delighted to bring Jeff on board – initially as a contractor, but later on with Jeff buying into the business – because of his manifest talent, outside-the-box thinking style, and relentless drive.
“At the time, Fuzzy was very much specialised in automation consulting,” Jeff says. “That’s how Bas and I started – because that’s what we were both very experienced in.”
Jeff was instrumental in pushing the boundaries of what Fuzzy LogX offered into the “big world of DC design”.
“That’s something that Bas and I really developed after I came on board: full DC design capabilities – from a concept on the back of a serviette, all the way till the first pallets were out the door, to realising the promise of a business case three months later.”
Fast forward to today, where Jeff was recently in New Zealand for the opening of a Woolworths DC in Auckland, New Zealand, the design and build of which Fuzzy LogX had overseen since its inception years earlier.
“It was a massive, grand event,” Jeff says. “The Mayor of Auckland was there and the Managing Director for Woolworths in New Zealand, together with the Iwi (the local tribal leaders). It was an amazing experience – and it was a special moment for me because we’d been through the process from the beginning; through 60 or 70 different concept designs and a $180 million investment. And we’d seen it through.”
This success is illustrative of where Fuzzy LogX is today – and how it is well and truly a leader in independent warehouse design.
“Our significance in the industry is really about independence,” Jeff says. “Independence, the continuity we provide clients, and our personalised approach. The moment you meet Bas, you know it’s about the relationship with our clients and creating the best possible warehouse workspaces. It’s not about making money or racking up consulting hours. We don’t shoehorn clients into solutions, and – while we’re always on call whenever our clients need us – we don’t embed ourselves permanently. We want clients to be independent, and to not need us anymore. It’s about delivering unique value to them.
“Our clients always say to us that Fuzzy does things differently – completely differently to other consultants. That’s because we’re all about value, about getting things done with no fluffing around. We’re not fluffy. We’re Fuzzy.”
DIVERSE BACKGROUNDS AND DIVERSE MINDS
Over the past seven years, Bas and Jeff have built a culturally and intellectually diverse team at Fuzzy LogX, because they’re always on the lookout for new people who’ll bring exceptional capabilities to the table.
“It’s funny,” Bas says, “while we never intentionally set this out as a goal, by its nature Fuzzy LogX has sought out interesting people with diverse backgrounds, personal stories, and skills. I’m Dutch, Jeff is Chilean-Australian – and among our team we also have people of Indian, Sri Lankan, Colombian, Malaysian, German-Croatian, and Vietnamese backgrounds, and a few Aussies. Everything under the sun.”
Yohan Fernando, Manager – Data Science and Systems, was brought on more than four years ago to boost the sophistication of Fuzzy LogX’s data analysis capabilities.
“Bas and Jeff brought me on so that Fuzzy could push the limits of what they could achieve with data – to processing it quicker, streamline analysis, as well as make things more standardised and reproducible,” Yohan says. “They were very keen on that because Jeff and Bas are so focused on testing and verification.”
But Yohan says he was attracted to – and has thrived within – Fuzzy LogX because of the company’s strong commitment to “ethics and independence”, because it’s always looking out for the customer and the best solution and never for “kickbacks”.
“It’s also just a really fun place to work,” Yohan adds. “We work hard, but we have fun. And every day I’m surrounded by interesting people who teach me a lot and – I hope – who I have taught a bit as well.”
Marina Longbottom, Intralogistics Consultant, is a recent addition to the team – and Fuzzy’s first team member permanently stationed in Melbourne.
Marina is a vital new team member not only because she is a permanent Melbourne-presence for Fuzzy (its main office is in Sydney) but because Bas was keen to bring on someone who really knew the operations side of DCs inside and out.
“Running a DC – the operations side – is really my forte,” Marina says. “Fuzzy has such a great team of innovative designers, engineers, and data-wizards – like Yohan. I see my role in Melbourne as really assisting with the on-the-ground integration focus.
“I came in around November 2021 and immediately was working on a project developing toolboxes and training components with the workers that ran operations day-in, day-out. For Fuzzy it’s very important that we identify and work with champions inside our clients’ teams who can really advocate and drive changes; and keep up the pace after our work is done.”
It was the personal – and personality – focus of Fuzzy LogX that attracted Marina to the company. “I saw that Fuzzy wasn’t just about doing high-level PowerPoint presentations and delivering solutions in the abstract. It was and is the highly personalised and client-side philosophy that sets it apart.”
For more information on Fuzzy Logx, click here.