Manually managing inventory at scale is repetitive and time-consuming
LKQ processes around 800,000 used autos a year across over 165 locations. As each end-of-life vehicle comes in, it must be fully damage assessed for its value, before all its recyclable and reusable parts – that could reach well over 100 items for each car – are tagged and inventoried.
Because the entire inventory management process can be repetitive and time-consuming, LKQ were looking for ways to streamline operations, to automate how they detect and assess damage – after which, they procure the vehicle, tag and inventory many recyclable parts.
Yogi Shivdasani, LKQ’s Vice President of North America Supply Chain, reviewed several other solutions for artificial intelligence (AI) damage assessment, but in his words “nothing was remotely accurate enough to deploy in our live processes.”
“Tractable is far more advanced than anything else out there. They’re a great partner and dug in to understand the specific needs of our organization, and moved fast to take us all the way from initial testing to production at scale. Tractable is obsessed with positive results and realizing any ROI.”
Yogi Shivdasani, VP of North America Supply Chain, LKQ
Faster and more accurate assessment of recyclable parts
Yogi Shivdasani saw a demo of Tractable’s Auto Inspector tool, and did his own test of the AI using photos from Google to assess a number of auto parts.
“It came back in about three seconds with very, very accurate assessments of multiple parts with multiple levels of damage” says Shivdasani. “It truly worked. The AI instantly figured out the panels that were visible in the photos and how damaged they were. I was pretty blown away to be honest. And I thought this technology could benefit LKQ.”
Tractable’s Auto Inspector tool uses computer vision to assess the specific damage on a vehicle and then determines which parts can be recycled and reused.
The AI is trained on millions of examples of auto damage, and can perform on a level with human intelligence, increasing the speed, consistency and accuracy of decisions.
Tractable worked closely with the LKQ team to ensure that the Auto Inspector tool was calibrated to LKQ’s industry standards regarding accurate damage assessment.
“Tractable’s approach is very collaborative,” said Shivdasani. “They really went in depth with us to understand our needs and our standards and to make sure the AI is delivering real value to us. Our engineering teams have been working hand-in-hand together for a super lightning-fast integration. They are extremely particular with calibration and testing.”
