WO2022049413A1

WO2022049413A1 - Fully automated stable and portable store without requiring any human intervention

Info

Publication number: WO2022049413A1
Application number: PCT/IB2020/058316
Authority: WO
Inventors: Farzad PEIRAVI ESFAHANI; Mahnaz RAFIEI SHAHRAKI; Abtin PEIRAVI ESFAHANI; Azindokht PEIRAVI ESFAHANI
Original assignee: Peiravi Esfahani Farzad; Rafiei Shahraki Mahnaz
Priority date: 2020-09-07
Filing date: 2020-09-07
Publication date: 2022-03-10

Abstract

The invention introduces a fully automated shop store requiring no human intervention in none of the process of shopping. According to the method that is disclosed in this invention, the store is divided into two completely separated area that is called ordering area and stock area in both stable & portable stores. The customer will be recognized and receives a code at the time of entering into the ordering area by passing through the entrance gate. This code is used in the next stages to distinguish each customer from another and the customer will be able to order only by going to a showcase or electronic display connecting to a computer, searching for his/her necessaries and scan their code to be added in the list order. After finalization of list order, an intelligent mechanism including robots, pick up the goods form shelves and baskets that are placed in a predefined position in the stock area and put them on a system of conveyors to be transferred to the customer at one outlet in ordering area.

Description

FULLY AUTOMATED STABLE AND PORTABLE STORE REQUIRING ANY HUMAN INTERVENTION

Technical field of this invention talks about type of stores without the necessity of presence of a seller inside fully automated superstore, having the ability of purchasing from at any time day or night. Customers can personally attend at stores using smart equipment. Actually, this invention is a method to receive the order verbally from the customer and delivering it to an outlet gate without interference of the seller or any human intervention.

Nowadays all types of stores including groceries, clothing shops, drugstores and etc. need different employees such as seller, cashier, observer as well as a platform to display all available products and a place to keep more numbers of each product in case needed. In this traditional system due to engagement of human, there is a great chance of making mistakes in process of calculations or stoke checking or even robbery. Besides, shopping itself from the beginning to end is a time consuming process. It includes the burden of picking trolley and taking it with yourself all the time, standing in lines, products checking process when leaving, not having different brands of each product and low output. these are only a few problems of current method of selling in a store.

This invention is aimed to facilitate the process of shopping for the costumer. He is able to pick the intended real product himself from the showcase or a computer display without the presence of any seller, check it thoroughly and put it back in the showcase, the ordering it in his desired quantity by cellphone. Subsequently, he can pay the specified amount and receive the ordered goods automatically all at once. By the way, at some occasions that the costumer can’t go to the store personally, he can order by the application of portable installed on his cellphone, therefore; the portable one will attend at his location, giving the costumer the opportunity to shop from it. The before mentioned invention applied a different kind of method from this under research invention, while lacking some advantages of this one.

Patent application US9911290B1 discloses a “Wireless coded communication (WCC) devices for tracking retail interactions with goods and association to user accounts” that the store has lots of shelves equipped with bar code reader sensors under the ceiling. The costumer should take what he needs personally from these shelves, while sensors read its bar code simultaneously. The problems of this method is that costumers should have access to all available products and shall carry all purchased products with himself while shopping. This invention applies different methods from the present one and lacks some advantages of it.

Patent application US12/727,064 discloses a system of purchasing goods that the costumer himself takes all the intended product from the shelves and at the end of shopping and before exiting, all good’s bar codes will be scanned, the invoice will be paid and shopping process gets completed.

Patent application PCT/IB2019/054586, a method for order to delivery process without vendor involvement, filed by the same inventor as this application, is a less improved one comparing to the method in new statement and the detailed mechanism of operation doesn’t explain clearly in this application.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/amazon_Go : The disclosed method of purchasing on this website is using a mobile app to recognize the customers as well as their credit. The store has lots of shelves equipped with bar code reader cameras under the ceiling. The costumer should take what he needs personally from these shelves. While cameras read its bar code simultaneously. In this method, the customer also needs to enter the store and seek for his favorite in a very wide area between different shelves and carry the goods to the exit gate.

https://Yellrobot.com/robots-bag-your-groceries-at-cashierless-supermarket-in-singapore: In this system, the costumer himself should take the product from the shelves and scan the bar code simultaneously and pay it at the end.

https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/sweden-app-enabled-automated-store: In this method, the same as all above mentioned, the costumer picks the product from the shelves personally and registers the bar cod by cellphone. The shelves are designed as vertical closets with glass made doors, including steady inner side shelving equipped with electronic locks on the door. The costumer needs to get subscription code in order to be able to open the lock. He stands in front if the shelf’s door, entering the code through store’s application installed on his cell phone.

The present invention is an entirely automatic shopping store with no need for walking among hundreds of shelves and looking for the desired product. According to this method, the customer only needs to validate himself/herself and his/her credit by passing through a gate and ordering his needs by choosing from an app or scanning a barcode of those goods by picking up a sample of them from the special showcases that are located in ordering area and just one sample of each product is in the showcase.

Detailed description of the invention

In order to solve aforementioned problems, a new mechanism has been applied and it is a combination of rotating shelves and robots besides smart showcase and cell phone with related software and hardware. This is applicable in both stable and portable stores. The costumer goes to the store and after getting identified by store’s smart system, picks his intended product from smart showcase which is attached to it by a cable or equipped with a chip for safety. There can be also some electronic systems connecting to a monitor so that the customer is able to search between all goods and select the desired ones, then scan the QR code to put that one the list order.

Actually, the abovementioned automatic store is completely separated in two parts, ordering area and stock area. After getting entered to the ordering area, the customer will be assigned a code that makes it possible in next stages to order his desires and do the payment. To complete this process there is a need for an application on his/her phone, although it is feasible to choose another smart method like credit cards or ID cards, then the applicant should scan the barcode of each merchandise from a list in a real sample showcase or by visual methods on his/her phone or on an electronic display in ordering area. By the end of ordering process, the special robotic mechanism in stock area starts to work and preparing the ordered goods to send them to the customer in ordering area.

In ordering area, after checking the product, it will be returned to the showcase and through one of the mentioned ways, the customer orders whatever he intends to. Afterwards, it will be paid through store’s smart cashier or costumer’s cellphone. All the products ordered formerly will be delivered together and packed in the delivery gate while leaving the store, as it requires not taking any from the shelf and putting and carrying in trolley by himself.

The before mentioned system is installable not only in current stores but also on any type of pickups. In case installed on trucks, the costumers are able to call for the portable store in their own location through the application, or when getting informed from store’s location, go to where it is.

In this invention, below parts are going to be designed:
Rotating shelves
Robots
Product transferring and delivering system
A showcase to organize purchasable goods
Costumer identification system and Hotspot
Software and application
Store’s initiating software
Control system

In stock area, for designing rotating shelf (drawing A) that most of the goods are located in, first it should be determined what type of product considering its weight and size is going to be placed in each shelf, so the design of each shelf’s size will be done by knowing these factors. Afterwards, taking into account the weight it should tolerate, the inducted force to the basket, its holding axle and the frame will be calculated. Then by designing and data analysis software, the main frame of shelves is modeled. Calculations will be done and based on the output and results inferred from analysis and produced forces are determined. Considering the required capacity to tolerate the inducted forces, suitable segments and structures’ specifications and type will be designed. Finally, the assembling process will be done.

In order to assemble, at first shelf’s profile of metal chassis is cut and the main frame (3) shaped on frame’s stand (1). There is a place for attaching to earth screws (2) that are connected to main frame (3) and rail (4) is installed on it. Electro gearbox (13) and pulley (10) are placed on the frame (3) and force transferring chain (12) together with shelves’ rotating belt (11) are assembled on it. Connecting clips (8) of belt to shaft or shelves axle are placed with specified spaces with each other on shelf rotating belt (11) by related screws (9). Baskets (5) are placed on shaft or shelves axle (6) equipped with bearings (7), then this shaft (6) is installed on shelves main frame (3) by connecting clip (8). After transferring the command from smart system, the electro gearbox (13) will rotate and its power makes the baskets set turning around through force transferring chain (12) and shelves rotating belt (11).

The robot (14) is located inside the rail (4) that is movable on its wheel (17) in line with rail’s axle. Based on the receiving command, the specific basket in which the product is placed, stands in exact column. Robot’s stand (14) is capable of rotating 360 degrees around its linear axle. Robot’s arm (15) is also capable of full 360 degrees rotation around arm’s linear axle as well as vertical axle on it. At the end of this arm (15) good’s receiver (16) is located that is chosen considering the type of product going to be taken by it from shelves. It is able to rotate 360 degrees around linear axle of robot’s arm, capable of grabbing goods by different methods. Although any size can be selected for rotating shelves set; in this design, shelves main frame length is 4.5 m, and baskets with length of 70 cm, width of 30 cm and height of 35 cm are selected. Therefore, each frame includes 72 baskets in every 6 columns and 12 rows. Arm’s (15) length from robot (14) placed on the main frame (3) has been chosen in a way that is able to not only pick goods from baskets (5) underneath itself located on highest row of main frame (3), but also is able to take goods from baskets in highest row of the two other main frames (5) on sides of the frame in store. It is possible due to robot’s freedom of moving and leads to more economic design. So each robot is capable of covering at least three main frames (3) parallel to each other. According to number of customers and store’s capacity at a specific time, it may even be able to cover more main frames (3) which now are organized progressively.

Afterwards, based on the programming in which each shelf has been identified according to its matrix specifications; the system is able to rotate baskets column (5) around linear and horizontal axle of main frame (3), after getting the command from smart system, it will choose the basket of intended good from the row and column that is placed into and will locate it into the highest row of main frame (3), accessible to the robot (16) related to that specified column. Consequently, the robot is also able to take the ordered product by costumer and delivered by system from the basket and move on to conveyor belt. Aiming to this, there is conveyor belt (18) in front of the main frame (3), parallel to it in closest distance which is installed on vertical stand of frame (3) by two chassis. This conveyor (18) after receiving the goods by robot, transfers each of them toward vertical transferring system (19) that takes the product from highest to lowest.

A rail or a conveyor belt (20) for transferring goods capable of horizontal rotation has been installed underneath the vertical transferring system (19), based on the receiving command from store’s smart system, leads the product toward one of the transferring conveyor belts (21) (22) (23) (which are equal in number with gates and allocated to each) in order to deliver to the costumer in the specified gate. Goods delivering gate (24) is a case with two inlets (25) and outlets (26) on its entrance and exit, that at the beginning the primary inlet opens for entering purchased goods by costumer and closes after entrance of the last product. When the primary inlet (25) closes, then the secondary one (26) opens to move the goods toward the table in front of costumer and gate. While exiting the last product from the case, the outlet (26) also closes.

The showcase (27) can be designed and built with any material and including any number of rows and columns of shelves, in accordance with the size and type of each product going to be located in it, considering the quantity of products in this showcase, a chip and connecting cable (28) has been designed that is attached to each product, in case it gets cut off the cable, the system alarms. Showcase height is suitable with human height, as the costumer will be able to check and take his desired product from it. In this store the costumer can only see one sample of each product.

At store’s entrance, a customer recognition system (29) equipped with “NFC” and “QR code printer” is placed which performs as the store’s reception system. It is capable of recognizing the costumer through his cell phone equipped with “NFC”, in case his cell phone does not have “NFC”, a “QR code” will be shown for the costumer to be scanned by his cell phone. As the costumer has been connected to store’s “Wi-Fi”, he can get identified through the system and therefore connected. For paying the receipts the costumers, a POS (30) system equipped with a screen has been installed.

In this system in order to relate costumer’s cell phone to store’s system, a hotspot (access point) is required and to connect the systems a processor is also needed. (one processor in “hotspot” system and another one for programming the processors themselves from “AVR”, “FPCE”). All the operations including; product’s selection, registration, calculations and total price and then reporting to the systems are executable. The connection between “hotspot” and the system can be with cable or wireless. In wireless status in “hotspot” system, a receiver and sender is required, but in cable form the data will be transferred to the systems as series. Giving the opportunity of purchasing through cell phones, an application and store’s initiating software has been designed in which all factors have been anticipated and programmed. To sum up, in this system the costumer purchases through a definite way, although it may be some differences in recognition system of costumer when entering the store which is relatable to having a cell phone equipped with “NFC’ or lack of it. Hence, using store’s application installed on his cell phone, the costumer will get recognized by store’s reception system through one of below methods. If the cell phone is equipped with “NFC”, the costumer will place it on “reception” system and gets identified, allocating a personal number, his account activates for purchasing. If the cell phone isn’t equipped with “NFC”, the costumer can connect to store’s hotspot through “Wi-Fi” and uses his credit card in “reception” to get a QR code, then scan it and getting identified as a costumer to activate his account. After identifying the costumer by store’s system, he can scan the bar code on any intended product from the showcase with his cell phone. All the goods are attached to the showcase by a safety cable (28) which alarms in case gets separated. After scanning ordered products, their list together with prices will be shown automatically on costumer’s cell phone and he should only decide the quantity of each and the total price will be given afterwards.

When scanning the QR code of specified product in showcase, all the information and details as well as the photos or even videos of it can be shown in costumer’s cell phone. Before finalizing the order, he is also able to edit whatever he has decided to buy before payment. After paying the invoice by cell phone or credit card using the POS (30), the delivery command will be given to the system. Primarily the baskets (5) containing purchased goods will rotate to be moved to the highest row of shelves and stop rotating after reaching to it, in order to be accessible for robots (14). The robot (14) will stand over baskets column to pick the numbers of ordered products by its arm (15) and receiver (16) and transfer them to the conveyor belt (18). The goods on conveyor belt (18) will be taken to one of the belts (21) (22) (23) by vertical transferring system (19) and transferring goods conveyor belt (20), which is capable of horizontal rotation. These will be brought to the delivery gate and spread into one of the allocated gates (24) that are separated for each costumer. The costumer can receive all his ordered products from the specified gate. (in this invention equal to number of transferring to gate belts (21) (22) (23), a separated goods delivery gate (24) has been considered. Transferring the order from the stock to the gate, can be done by conveyor belt as well as smart trolley.

Smart trolley looks the same as current normal ones but equipped with electronic motor, sensor and receiver. In some large stores that have enough space for moving trolleys, these smart types can also be used instead of conveyor. Smart trolley gets the command through the receiver and goes to matrix status of each product column in stock. The robot puts the product in it and the process continues until taking the last ordered product and finally moves toward the allocated delivery gate of that costumer.

When the costumer goes to the store with a cell phone equipped with “NFC”, puts it on the “reception” set and gets identified, if the cell phone lacks “NFC”, he can use the credit card to get a QR code, then he can scan the printed code with his cell phone and gets identified by store’s system. In both cases by allocating a personal number his account will be activated. Afterwards the costumer can attend at the showcase to pick the product, check it and turn it back to the showcase, if the costumer desires to buy it, can scan the bar code with his smart phone. The process is similar for all inquired products. The quantity of each ordered product will be selected on the smart phone and registered. After confirming the availability of each one, the costumer can pay the total amount through credit card by POS in store or the application on his cell phone, waiting to receive the order. Store’s system calls him for the specified gate of delivering the order and the costumer leaves the store without physical inspection.

In portable store through the application, customers can ask for the store to come to their own location or go to the location of store. The shopping process is exactly the same as stable ones with this technology. In portable stores, the costumer will get identified through the reception system installed on the chamber of truck and chooses the product from the showcase placed on the chamber which is only available for him from outside, payment process is also the same as before. Delivery gate has been placed at back of the chamber and the costumer can receive ordered goods from there.

The invention is applicable for mobilized stores, groceries, clothing shops, spare parts stores, drug stores and home appliances store and for storeroom is also applicable without the payment system. In storeroom only by showing the identification digital card or finger print of the specific person known for the system, command of delivering products will be issued. (multiple use of the invention)

advantages of this invention over previous similar ones:
1. having a type of automatic portable store, which can move to costumer’s location based on his request through the store’s application
2. giving services to the costumer who attends at the location of the store even at time of closure (in this occasion products delivery gate and a part of showcase is placed on outer part of the store near to the sidewalk, that costumer can purchase from there.)
3. faster shopping services and preventing time consuming
4. ease of shopping (in which the customer does not have to take products one by one with trolleys)
5. the ability of selling without presence of any seller
6. higher safety comparing to previous models without the necessity to check the costumer
7. fully automated
8. applicable in different types of stores (for all packaged products is applicable and for non-packaged ones can also be practical by considering some factors.)
9. easy execution
10. not requiring a large space for the store comparing to current typical ones, being more economic considering less investment for the land and building to three times less than usual as well as decreasing employees’ charges.
(this method ends to better use of store’s space, as only one sample of each product is available in the showcase while the rest are in the stocks room. The needed space for costumers to walk between shelves with trolleys in hand has also been eliminated.)
11. applicable in industry and industrial units’ stocks room
12. presenting a variety of products and increasing the capacity to three times more comparing to occupied space
13. the possibility of presenting selling services to customers via internet
14. installable on prefabricated rooms capable of changing dimensions

The store includes two main parts, the first part (ordering area) is for placing the showcase (27), product delivery gate (26), costumer recognition system equipped with “NFC”, “QR code printer” (29), POS (30). In fact, the costumer enters this space in stable stores and also in portable stores only has access to this space (the two parts are installed on truck’s chamber).
The second part (stock area) is for locating rotating shelves and equipped with robots (14), product transferring system, product delivery gate which is also called store’s stocks room and the costumer isn’t allowed to get into. In portable stores, this section is the truck’s chamber equipped with aforementioned equipment.

Frame stand
Attaching to earth screw
Main frame
Rail
Goods basket
Shaft or shelves axle
Bearing
Connecting clip
Connecting screw of connecting clip to the belt
Pulley
Shelves rotating belt
Force transforming chain
Electro gearbox
Robot’s stand
Robot’s arm
Goods receiving in robot
Robot’s wheel
Conveyor belt of horizontal transfer of goods
Vertical transferring of goods system
Distributer that receives goods from system and transfers to the gate by conveyors.
22. 23. Belts of transferring goods to delivery gate

24. delivery gate case
25. Inlet primary gate for entrance of goods from gate’s case
26. Outlet secondary gate for exiting goods from gate’s case
27. goods sample
28. goods attaching to showcase cable
29. costumer recognition system equipped with “NFC” and QR code printer in the store’s entrance
30. POS sets

Claims

What is claimed is a fully automated shop store without any human intervention in any of the various stages of purchase, including ordering, selecting, picking up and delivering goods to the customer whereas each customer is assigned a unique code by using his mobile phone or smart ID card at the time of entering the store characterized that the customer is able to order his/her desire merchandises by scanning its special unique QR code of a sample from a showcase or an electronic display with no necessity to search between shelves whereas a smart system consisting robots and conveyors pick up and transfer the ordered goods to an outlet where the customer is waiting to receive his/her order. The claimed system mainly comprises:
- An entrance area which has been equipped with a kind of surveillance, recognizing and identifying system to assign a unique code to each customer using their phone, smart ID or credit cards;
- An ordering area where the customer can request for any merchandises by scanning its barcode from a showcase or electronic display;
- A stock area where all the goods and items are placed in their special location into a basket of shelves in a predetermined point of a matrix array;
- A number of robots which are able to choose each item from its special position and pick it up to put on a system of conveyors to transfer the order to the outlet gate.
According to claim 1, after identifying by smart phone equipped with "NFC" or credit card, the customer is recognized immediately or receives a QR code at the entrance gate and by scanning the QR code using an app on his/her phone, he/she would be recognized as a new customer to the shopping system with a unique code;
According to claim 1, the customer just needs to go to a showcase to select a sample of his required goods and scan its barcode so that they will be put in the order list;
According to claim 1 and 3, it is possible to search the name of desired product in an online or offline database and choose the product or scan its barcode from an electronic display to put it in the list order;
According to claim 1, at the end of the process of ordering and after final confirmation by the customer, the smart and automatic related mechanism including robots and conveyors located in stock area starts to work in order to deliver the order list contents to the customer;
According to claim 1 and 5, each shelf and their baskets are located in a very precision point in the stock area so that the robot arms are able to pick up any determined box, pocket or bottle, etc. and leave it on the latitudinal conveyors;
According to claim 1 and 5, a system of latitudinal and longitudinal conveyors is installed between shelves to collect and transfer all the merchandise of each order list to the outlet.
According to claim 1, the robots are designed in such a way to be able to move on a rail alongside one shelf, pick up the item and put it on one latitudinal conveyors.
According to claim 1, a number of outlets have been embedded at the end of longitudinal conveyors to deliver all the items to the customer.
According to claim 1, at the end of the process of shopping, the customer will receive a bill via the app according to the order and he/she can pay for it at the exit using credit cards, NFC, etc.
What is claimed is the method of shopping from a fully automated shopping store, portable or stable, whereas the customer is assigned a code at the time of entering into the store by passing through a smart gate, while that code is used by smart phones or store’s software system to determine the order list on which the customer adds his/her desired list only by scanning a barcode from a showcase or a smart display system so that the ordered list will be packed automatically and sent to the customer while the customer doesn’t need to do any things when his/her order is being prepared unless paying the issued invoice at the end of the process through exit gate by NFC or other payment methods.
According to claim 11, the invented system has the ability to be portable by installing on a container so that the customer can introduce his/her location through a special app to the system and automatic store goes to his/her location to provide services for those who want to experience shopping on their own place.