Powered by AI, computer vision (CV) is proving its worth across sectors including retail, manufacturing, and industrial engineering. It’s no surprise that in the recent holiday season, CV played a crucial role in timely dispatches and deliveries, allowing retailers to exceed customer expectations.
In the quest for efficient logistics and warehouse management, enterprises are demanding both accuracy and efficiency. Warehouses are beginning to leverage AI and computer vision to improve worker safety and productivity. In the face of rising worker shortages and the pressure of order fulfillment, warehouses are innovating with technologies like robotics, computer vision, and automation.
For instance, Amazon is leveraging CV and drone technology to deliver medicines to their customers at their doorstep. Similarly, Home Depot uses computer vision to locate their stored products in their warehouses.
Is the warehouse the next big proving ground for computer vision? Let’s find out.
5 applications of CV in warehouses
Computer vision technology has a wide array of applications in the modern warehouse facility. Here are some of their use cases:
- Defect inspection
Defective products are a constant problem for modern warehouses. For manual inspection, warehouse managers need to provision more time and human resources, thus causing bottlenecks in the production process. Enabled by connected cameras, CV applications can detect defective products in a few seconds.
- Robots
Warehouse facilities implement collaborative robots to perform repetitive tasks like loading or unloading products and transporting cargo around the warehouse. Powered by computer vision, robots (embedded with warehouse maps, cameras, and sensors) can improve work efficiency in any warehouse. Besides reducing manual labor, robots also lower the costs of warehouse management.
- Product dimensioning
With CV solutions, manufacturers can capture product dimensions accurately using its object dimensioning capability. With the increasing volume of stored products, warehouses need to automate their product dimensioning activity. CV-powered automatic dimensioning systems can accurately calculate product dimensions and weight, thus saving both space and money. When enabled with barcode scanning, these dimensioning systems can improve delivery speeds and lower shipping costs.
- Order fulfillment
As in the Amazon example, drone-powered order fulfillment systems enable eCommerce warehouses to ship products directly to customers. Among other applications, CV-powered drones can perform multiple warehouse tasks including:
- Counting inventory items in areas inaccessible by humans.
- Searching for products based on a particular bar code.
- Inspect the warehouse facility for any leakages or safety hazards.
- Capture and store warehouse activities through images or videos.
- Product picking and packaging
Even with advanced training, human personnel continue to commit mistakes in picking and packaging operations in warehouses. Enabled by computer vision technology, smart glasses can automate this “traditional” way of product picking and packing. CV systems can automatically detect a picking operation and check the correct placement of the product in any container. Some of the benefits include reduced picking time, fewer human errors, and the detection of defective items.
Benefits of CV technology in warehouses
How does Computer vision technology benefit warehouses? Here are some of the benefits:
- Operational efficiency
Computer vision systems can improve operational efficiency in warehouses by automating tasks previously performed by human workers. Along with efficiency, CV systems can improve the speed of various warehouse operations like:
- Removing defective products
- Locating the right product stored in the warehouse
- Picking and packaging products
- Workplace safety
Using computer vision, modern warehouse managers can also improve worker safety by identifying potential risks in manual handling. Warehouse workers face many occupational hazards when moving heavy loads, operating forklifts, and using “dangerous” machinery. Through continuous inspection, CV-enabled systems can monitor the warehouse facility for any safety risks like inflammable materials and roof leaks.
- Inventory management
With an integrated CV system, warehouse managers can also have real-time information about their stock levels, their locations, and the items that need replenishment. For example, through image capture and analysis, warehouse managers in Home Depot were able to capture daily updates on available inventory.
- Reduced costs
Using AI-enabled computer vision, warehouse personnel can reduce overall costs by automating many tasks prone to human errors. For instance, it can reduce the costs of frequent product returns or recalls. CV solutions can also power autonomous forklifts, thus reducing warehouse maintenance costs and meeting the shortage of forklift operators.
What are the challenges in implementing CV technology in warehouses?
With AI-enabled computer vision technology, warehouses can overcome most of the challenges associated with manual processes. However, the reality is that modern warehouses still find it challenging to leverage this technology in their facilities.
Among the major challenges, AI-powered CV solutions are still evolving. CV solution providers still must iron out integration challenges, which can impact warehouse operations. Additionally, AI-powered models (used in CV solutions) need high volumes of clean and accurate data, without which they produce inaccurate results. This means proper data collection and ingestion from a variety of data sources is needed to train the AI models properly. Also, the presence of data silos hampers the development of an integrated warehouse ecosystem.
To realize its full potential, companies need to integrate CV applications with other third-party enterprise solutions like intelligent automation, accounting, and procurement. That’s why an integrated CV platform-supported enterprise ecosystem becomes necessary.
How KamerAI’s CV Platform is Helping Enteroprises Exceed Customer expectations
With its cutting-edge Computer Vision platform, KamerAI has enabled retailers to exceed their customer expectations during the peak holiday season. Using AI and connected cameras, our CV-powered enterprise platform brings plenty of human-like capabilities like:
- Facial recognition
- Barcode reading and measuring
- Identification of unattended objects
- Measuring package dimensions
KamerAI’s CV solution is integrated across all warehouse operations including:
- Picking and packaging
- Material Handling
- Product shipping
- Compliance with OSHA requirements
Are you planning to implement CV technology in your warehouses? We can help you. Speak to our CV experts now.
