C-suite Interview with Keith Moore, CEO, AutoScheduler.AI: MODEX was a meeting place for innovation

Keith Moore, CEO, AutoScheduler.AI

MMH: What is your number one takeaway from MODEX 2024?

Moore: The amount of investment in distribution and warehousing has just exploded. ProMat and MODEX have always been fairly large shows, but this was the largest MODEX to date with1,200 exhibitors and more than 48,700 attendees. Almost everyone whom we’re currently working on active deals with was at the show. If you're in warehousing and distribution, MODEX was the meeting point for just about anybody and everybody, and it was a focal point of innovation, not just in automation and artificial intelligence (AI), but also robotics and general processes that different organizations are investing in, improving and working on.  

MMH: What are the three top market trends that you’re seeing right now?

Moore: First of all, AI is everywhere. You’re starting to see every business work to morph itself into an AI company in some capacity. That means if you're a robotics vendor, you're talking about the AI mesh layer that’s supporting your hardware and your platform. If you're a software vendor, it's about AI and decision-making and the enablement of folks that are working in distribution. There are all sorts of new AI tech companies that are popping up and trying to resolve challenges that have been prevalent in this space for a long time.

We’re also seeing more human robotic interactions and the need for industry to get a feel for how people interact with robots in the grand scheme of the DC, in terms of flowing inventory through the facility. Lastly, we’re seeing a bigger focus on visibility. As customers demand faster and faster service times, companies are trying to get more current and predictive data, the latter of which helps them understand where their distribution profile will be a few hours out, in a few days and even a few weeks into the future.

MMH: How is AutoScheduler.AI responding to these market trends?

Moore: Our warehouse resource planning and optimization platform dynamically orchestrates all activities on top of an existing warehouse management system (WMS) in real-time. We built AutoScheduler.AI as an AI decision support and automation platform for everything that comes into and goes out of a facility. We’re building plans for 24-to-48+ hours into the future and, as such, giving companies predictive visibility into their facilities and networks in a way that lets them centralize the distribution footprint and orchestrate everything across all of their sites in a way that's never been possible before