More and more businesses across industries are considering robotics and automation as a sustainable solution to help improve operational efficiency, fill labor gaps and increase worker productivity. But how do businesses get started? First, it’s critical for businesses to take a forward-looking approach to automation — what we refer to as the automation journey — to understand how robots can successfully integrate into your current and future operational goals. So, how can businesses go from considering advanced robotics and automation to seamlessly managing an entire fleet of robots that optimize operations, support employees and ultimately deliver better margins? Below, we define this journey and outline the different steps required to successfully deploy robots and reap the full benefits of automation technology.

Defining the Robotics & Automation Journey

A thoughtful robotics and automation strategy helps companies create a unified ecosystem to effectively deploy robotic solutions that work together to take on critical, repetitive tasks, collect insights and measure results. BrainOS® is the leading robotic artificial intelligence (AI) software platform to help forward-thinking companies manage and scale multiple robotic applications, from cleaning to Inventory Scanning. Here’s how Brain Corp defines the automation journey:

A ‘Clean’ Start With Robotic Scrubbers & Vacuums

Brain Corp typically advises companies to start their automation journey with ‘Clean’ — our product category that includes BrainOS®-powered autonomous floor scrubbers and vacuums. Cleaning has never been more important, yet many businesses are struggling with how to increase their cleaning capacity at a time when labor availability is scarce. BrainOS®-powered floor cleaning robots provide a consistent and measurable cleaning solution that works seamlessly with your employees and facility. Implementing floor cleaning robots is a great place for a company to start their automation journey, given the technology’s ease of use and immediate time and cost-savings that can be realized. While your team begins to utilize these robots, you can put into motion plans to add-on more applications to your existing mobile robots to generate even greater ROI.

Added ‘Sense’ of Purpose

After gaining more confidence and comfortability with robotic operations, companies are then encouraged to enhance the capabilities of their existing floor cleaning robots with ‘Sense’ — our product category that includes BrainOS®-powered Virtual Tours and Inventory Scan accessories. These innovations outfit existing robotic machines with computer vision to consistently, efficiently and accurately capture and analyze environmental data, including inventory availability, pricing accuracy, product location, planogram compliance and more. This data creates actionable insights that fuel better inventory decisions, facility management and customer experiences.

Let Insights ‘Flow’

Rather than being a third and separate phase in the automation journey, Brain Corp’s ‘Flow’ product category is actually an integral, ever-present robotic capability that exists within ‘Clean’ and ‘Sense.’ The ‘Flow’ category represents cloud tools and integrations, like our fleet management portal and BrainOS® Mobile app, that provide easy-to-navigate, detailed performance and usage analytics for each robot. Configurable daily and weekly reports easily verify robot performance — proving work has been completed, allowing for the quick recognition of processes that need improvement and fueling more strategic decision making.

How To Start Your Robotics & Automation Journey

Now that we’ve defined the automation journey, it’s time to outline the eight steps in the automation journey.

1. Identify a Need for Automation

Struggling to hire enough employees to cover an operational task, like cleaning floors or scanning shelves? Concerned about rising labor costs? Are your current employees over-extended? Looking to easily verify when tasks are completed? Wondering how to achieve a consistent clean or maintain fully-stocked, accurately priced shelves? Or generally just looking to create a smarter workforce? If you’ve answered yes to any of these questions, you’re ready to adopt robotic automation as a sustainable solution to your current operational challenges.

2. Select an Automation Partner

Once a company has identified a need for intelligent automation, it’s time to select an automation partner. And why not go with the industry leader? Brain Corp has deployed more robots than any other company, making BrainOS®-powered robots the most trusted and proven solutions available. Our ecosystem of robotic applications and services, connected through BrainOS®, enables seamless and effective automation technology adoption.

3. Talk to a Solutions Expert

One size does not fit all. Thankfully, with the BrainOS® platform, you can select from a variety of robotic automation solutions that will best fit your facility. Need additional support to select the right ones for you? Our experts are with you at every step in this process to ensure your operational needs are met.

4. Participate in a Demo

This is where the fun really begins! Once you’ve chosen Brain Corp as your automation partner, we come to your facility to conduct a demo. We’ll bring a BrainOS®-powered floor cleaning robot to one of your locations for a two to three-hour demo. You’ll see the robot in action, each task it can accomplish and how it supports your existing employees.

5. Launch a Pilot

Once your company has seen the demo and are comfortable working with a robotic system, the next step is to launch a pilot. The pilot entails using one BrainOS®-powered floor cleaning robot for 15 to 30 days at one location. During this step, companies experience how the robot integrates with your team during the day-to-day operations. You’ll see your employees take on higher-value tasks that robots can’t do, like customer service, and take ownership of managing the robot. Additionally, you’ll interact with never-before-available data and reporting that provide proof of compliance, track performance and help optimize operational efficiency.

6. Scale the Pilot

After a successful initial pilot, the next step in the process is for companies to scale the pilot. We’ll deploy three to five BrainOS®-powered floor cleaning robots to multiple locations for 60 days. This step is where companies witness the benefits of executing a holistic approach to leveraging intelligent automation — where all physical robots are unified and managed through the single cloud-connected platform, BrainOS®.

7. Full Deployment

Once a company has seen the value of robotic process automation, the next step is to officially roll out BrainOS®-powered floor cleaning robots to all of your locations. This step proves the importance of fleet-wide management and control and helps companies get the maximum value and insights from their robots while avoiding multi-vendor complexities. This step is also where companies will want to ensure robot operators consistently utilize all robots, ensuring the long-term success of the automation journey. Taking advantage of online robot fleet analytics, automated email reports and heat maps will help automation leaders easily maintain and improve autonomous usage across their robot fleet. By using a top-down approach, leadership can ensure that robot usage is built into daily workflows, identify outliers and convert low adopters to high adopters.

8. Add More Robotic Capabilities

Only BrainOS® enables innovative add-on applications, creating multi-purpose robots that drive new opportunities to maximize ROI and gain powerful business insights. In this step, companies are encouraged to add capabilities to their existing cleaning robots, including Virtual Tours and/or Inventory Scan. When a company decides to add on more capabilities to their autonomous systems, they’ll simply repeat steps one through seven. Your automation journey isn’t just about solving a singular operational challenge. It’s about creating a holistic automated system where robots seamlessly work alongside existing employees to enhance their jobs and deliver more intelligence across all your operations. The journey requires a thoughtful, forward-looking strategy, a trusted and proven automation partner and constant innovation that turns machines into Internet of Things (IoT) data platforms for your facility. Brain Corp, through its expertise, innovation and scale is uniquely positioned to support you on this journey every step of the way. Ready to adopt advanced robotics to automate critical, repetitive tasks? Contact us to get started.