US 11,989,684 B2
Camera-implemented article layout control method for shelves equipped with electronic shelf labels
Thierry Gadou, Paris (FR); François Robin, Paris (FR); Andreas Rössl, Voitsberg (AT); and Thomas Schwarz, Hohberg (DE)
Assigned to VusionGroup, (FR)
Appl. No. 16/648,120
Filed by SES-imagotag, Nanterre (FR)
PCT Filed Sep. 18, 2018, PCT No. PCT/EP2018/075221
§ 371(c)(1), (2) Date Mar. 17, 2020,
PCT Pub. No. WO2019/057716, PCT Pub. Date Mar. 28, 2019.
Claims priority of application No. 1758650 (FR), filed on Sep. 19, 2017.
Prior Publication US 2020/0234227 A1, Jul. 23, 2020
Int. Cl. G06Q 10/087 (2023.01); G06F 16/583 (2019.01)
CPC G06Q 10/087 (2013.01) [G06F 16/583 (2019.01)] 14 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for checking the layout of articles in a gondola of a sales area, with respect to a realogram database which stores, for each article identified by an article identifier, an expected layout in association with the article identifier and a product slot field unique to an electronic shelf label arranged in the sales area, wherein the product slot field unique to an electronic shelf label arranged in the sales area comprises a gondola number, a row number, and a label number, the method comprising computer-implemented steps of:
acquiring an image of the gondola by an imaging device;
recognizing, by pattern recognition, electronic shelf labels in the acquired image of the gondola;
detecting rows of electronic shelf labels, wherein detecting a row of electronic shelf labels comprises detecting an alignment of recognized electronic shelf labels;
consecutively numbering the detected rows to assign a number to each detected row;
in each detected alignment of recognized electronic shelf labels, consecutively numbering the recognized electronic shelf labels to assign a number to each recognized electronic shelf label;
for a recognized electronic shelf label of a detected row:
determining the product slot field unique to the recognized electronic shelf label by identifying the number assigned to the detected row as the row number of the product slot field and by identifying the number assigned to the recognized electronic shelf label as the label number of the product slot field;
identifying a matching area in the acquired image situated between the recognized electronic shelf label and one consecutive recognized electronic shelf label along the detected rows;
detecting layout information relating to articles in the matching area of the acquired image by image recognition;
identifying, in the realogram database, a stored product slot field matching with the determined product slot field and the article identifier associated with the stored product slot field matching with the determined product slot field; and
checking the compliance between the detected layout information and the expected layout stored in the realogram database in association with the identified article identifier;
wherein each electronic shelf label is associated in a labels database with a single article identifier, and, when a given electronic shelf label is associated or re-associated in the labels database with a specific article identifier, the product slot field unique to the given electronic shelf label is also associated or re-associated in the realogram database with the specific article identifier, such that the realogram database is updated in real-time in compliance with the labels database.