Watch: Ikea is expanding its fleet of inventory drones

If you went 20 years into the past and asked someone what we’d be using drones for now, they’d probably guess that we’d be getting our packages airlifted from across the country directly to our doorstep… but as it turns out, that isn’t very realistic (and honestly, ground shipping is fine). That doesn’t mean drones don’t have a purpose, though. That purpose just maybe isn’t as glamorous as instantly getting a new pair of jeans at a moment’s notice. 

At Ikea warehouses, drones are getting put to the test, and it’s working. Instead of using drones for delivery, Ikea is using drones to manage its large warehouses of inventory. Thanks to the hardware startup Verity, these blue and yellow drones are zipping around sixteen European stores, getting into high up, hard-to-reach places to scan items and keep inventory up-to-date. That’s a lot more efficient – and probably safer – than sending a human up on a lift one hundred feet into the air just to scan some products. This technology is compelling enough that Verity, which has been around for ten years, has raised over $40 million just in the last year.