Walmart, one of the largest retail supply chain group across the globe, has announced that it intends to supply shelf-scanning robots to more than fifty stores in the U.S. for restoring stocks after the stores run out of products, thereby saving precious time. These robots are also designed to scan aisles to detect the stock and find misplaced or missing products, incorrect price labels, and mislabeling. The data is then transferred to store-employees, who can then stock the shelves and locate faults. Sources claim that Walmart’s initiative has been predicted to help retailers overcome their out-of-stock issues, thereby preventing huge monetary losses.
As per reports, the firm has been testing shelf-scanning robots in some of its stores across California, Arkansas, and Pennsylvania. Some of the key officials of the firm, have been quoted stating that robots are more productive as compared to humans and have the ability to scan store shelves three times faster than their human counterparts. Walmart has however, stated that the induction of robots in its stores will not reduce the employee count.
It has been reported that Walmart’s main business rival, Amazon makes use of Kiva robots for carrying out various warehouse activities such as picking & packaging the goods. According to Walmart, the escalating need for process automation across the retail stores to improve the shopping experience of its customers has led to its decision of installing robots.
For the record, Walmart had also set up huge pickup towers that were designed to perform operations similar to self-service kiosks. The firm has also been testing unmanned aerial vehicles for home delivery of its products as well as for detecting warehouse stock. Walmart’s current establishment of bots in its stores only affirms the fact that it has been improving the efficiency of its retail landscape, cite experts.