Stock Take, Physical Inventory, Cycle Counting

inventory 

Traditional methods of scanning stock involve lifting staff up to great heights using a forklift. 

DroneScan has developed three revolutionary robotic systems for data collection in large uniform warehouses. These solutions for inventory stock take, provide live feedback and integration with Warehouse Management systems. They have proven to save hundreds of man-hours but most importantly have provided a safer alternative to traditional labour-intensive methods involving reach trucks, forklifts, man-cages and scissor-lifts. 

A live video feed allows the operator to inspect the condition of products or verify the contents of the pallets.

Video and photo images can later be associated to scanned items in the database for off-line viewing.

The simplicity of the DroneScan system means that there are no expensive infrastructure costs needed to setup a warehouse.

The only preparation is to load up a file of the warehouse contents into the DroneScan database. The Hummingbird, Buffalo or Meerkat units set up and run to collect data. And finally, after or during scanning, reports and files can be generated and sent directly to the warehouse manager or uploaded directly into the WMS.

Both the Hummingbird and Buffalo systems are portable allowing one Hummingbird or Buffalo unit to be utilised in different warehouses. The Hummingbird and Buffalo can be setup in 10 minutes and packed away in 5 minutes to be moved to another location. They come with robust travel cases and the Hummingbird system can be transported within airline baggage weight allowances.

Some warehouses have good quality bin location barcodes correctly positioned on the racks. In these cases the Hummingbird and Buffalo can scan the bin location barcodes on the racks and use them to improve the accuracy of the position estimation.

Inspection of stock

Inspecting the condition of items or verifying the contents of a product is usually done manually. DroneScan provides a way to do this quickly and efficiently. As the drones are fitted with a camera, DroneScan allows still images to be taken for later processing or a live video feed for FPV viewing.

The still images and the video footage can be uploaded to the server and linked to the item in the warehouse management software for later retrieval and reporting purposes.

The DroneScan software associates images with scanned items and this can be viewed offline using the DroneScan software or uploaded to the customer's WMS.

Providing Live Feedback

Visual feedback

The DroneScan ground station tablet and software communicates with the drone via a peer to peer RF connection. This leaves the tablet's wifi connection available for communicating with the customer's network. 

The operator controls the drone via a radio controller with joysticks and the tablet mounts on top of the controller allowing for easy viewing while flying. The DroneScan user interface is simplified and optimised for touch screen.  The touch screen design allows the operator to input commands, control the configuration of the scanning system, modify the frequency and range that the scanner searches for barcodes and interact with the warehouse virtual location model to set the drone's position.

A high-visibility on-drone visual display is mounted at an ergonomic angle on the drone to allow for operator feedback during scanning and is easily seen from the ground while the drone is in flight. The primary feedback information shown on the drone is an incremental SCAN number as well as feedback such as:

• "OK": the scanned barcode is in the correct location
• "BIN ERR": the scanned barcode is in the wrong location
• "NOT FOUND": meaning the scanned barcode is not found in the provided data

The display also communicates the BIN location where the scanned product should be, allowing the operator to correlate with the physical location that they see. The operator can also see the remaining battery life.

AUDITORY FEEDBACK

In addition to the scan success indicator screen, audible cues and another visual signs are emitted.  For example, the operator will hear a loud beep following a scan and see a flashing bright light. 

Integration

The drone logs its data to the DroneScan database, the ground station software integrates to customer systems, files and the cloud, not only for storing the data scanned but to provide position and navigation information to the drone.

The DroneScan ground station tablet and software communicates with the drone via a peer to peer RF connection. This leaves the tablet's wifi connection available for communicating with the customer's network, allowing for real time integration.

Customised integration solutions can be developed using the following technologies:

• File import/export  (e.g. Excel, CSV, Tab Delimited, XML)
• Web Services (e.g. REST, SOAP)
• API (e.g. RFC, BAPI)
• IoT (Azure IoT hub)

We have experience integrating to ERP systems such as SAP, Sage, Syspro and others, and can build additional customised systems around customer's unique requirements.