Warehouses and factories are the enterprise hub of inventory control, but the perennial push for speed and automation is creating opportunities for AI drones to track products and handle manual tasks. AI drones, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles, can operate fully autonomously 24/7, even when the premises are closed and the lights are out.

"What we're looking into for our automation within our distribution centers is a dark warehouse for cycle counting," said Ryan Whitney, director of enterprise data at WinSupply, a 70-year-old construction distribution company. "When the associates are leaving for the night, say around 2 a.m. and then they're kicking back up at 6 a.m., what we'd love to have in that window of time is drones counting the actual product on the shelves and ensuring that the product is there. The best part is we can have the lights off because there's nobody else in the warehouse. The drones can just do their thing and maneuver around."

Manual inventory counting at WinSupply involves workers scanning products as they walk around the warehouse. During this process, there's always the possibility that a product can be missed, requiring a recount to ensure accurate reporting. "We want to decrease manual touch as much as possible," Whitney said.

Logistics and supply chain company Geodis deployed Gather AI drones to reduce time and labor costs and improve inventory tracking accuracy. The inventory scanning process, including barcodes, lot codes, expiration dates and box counts, is completed 15 times faster by the drones compared to manual scanning methods, according to a Geodis case study by Gather AI. In addition, the amount of pallet locations scanned increased 50% to 1,200 per day by one drone operator versus just 800 by four manual counters.

At footcare and footwear product company Scholl, annual total inventory checks are required to meet financial compliance. The process required a full warehouse shutdown, pausing all shipments and delaying order fulfillments for several days to manually count 12,000 pallet locations. After deploying a Verity autonomous drone system, inventory counting audits were shifted to off-hours to avoid shutdowns and direct inventory costs were reduced by 50%, based on a case study by Scholl, Verity and transport company DSV. The drones operate in high areas, eliminating the need for lifts or other rented equipment during the audit.

Manual inventory counting at Dermalogica's primary distribution center required a dedicated cycle counter who could take up to two months to complete one pass through the facility. The skin-care product maker implemented the Corvus One inventory drone system, which performed fully autonomous aerial inventory scans outside of active hours, "with no GPS, no localization beacons or stickers on the racks," said Corvus Robotics enterprise sales director Tony Esquith.