Programmed, part of the PERSOL Group, is a leading provider of staffing, facility management and maintenance services, employing over 30,000 people annually across a wide range of industries in Australasia.
Specialising in commercial painting, open space, electrical technologies, signage and building projects, Programmed sought a solution to improve asset inspections, reduce risks, and enhance workforce efficiency.
By adopting DroneDeploy as its primary digital asset capture platform, the company has streamlined operations, improved accuracy and enhanced safety.
The challenge:
→ Manual inspections were inefficient and high-risk
Programmed’s teams conduct thousands of asset inspections annually, often requiring physical access to dangerous or hard-to-reach locations, such as telecom towers and building rooftops. Traditional inspections were time-consuming, costly, and posed significant safety risks, particularly related to working at heights.
→ Lack of automation slowed project execution
Estimating projects such as large-scale commercial painting jobs relied on manual measurements, potentially leading to inconsistencies in area calculations. With 7-8 million litres of paint used annually, accurate measurements were critical to optimising costs and reducing waste.
→ Environmental factors impacted workforce productivity
New Zealand’s heavy rainfall and Australia’s extreme heat limited outdoor working hours, occasionally affecting job completion times. The company needed automated monitoring solutions to maintain efficiency despite these constraints.
The solution: implementing DroneDeploy for reality capture
Programmed integrated DroneDeploy into its operations to automate asset inspections, improve measurement accuracy, and reduce safety risks.
→ Transforming asset inspections with drones
- Previously, inspecting telecom towers required manual climbing, taking up to 16 hours per tower. With DroneDeploy, the same inspections now take five hours or less.
- In large-scale projects, such as golf course maintenance, dock drones provide automated, ongoing monitoring of soil health, mowing patterns, and fairway conditions.
→ Automating commercial painting and measurement calculations
- DroneDeploy is developing an automated measurement tool for Programmed, allowing surveyors to scan buildings digitally and generate precise surface area calculations.
- With over 30-40 million square meters painted annually, these accurate measurements are expected to double the efficiency of surveyors and estimators.
→ Enhancing safety and compliance
- DroneDeploy was first introduced as a safety tool to reduce working at heights, a leading cause of industry injuries.
- Using drones for pre-work site surveys allows teams to identify hazards, plan access points, and ensure compliance before arriving on-site, reducing risk exposure.
"If that building had been scanned and actually shown where the access points were and how we could have walked across the building, that life-changing injury would never have happened."
– Henry Arundel, CEO, Programmed Property Services
The result: benefits and ROI
→ Increased efficiency and cost savings
- Telecom tower inspections now take five hours instead of 16, significantly reducing labour costs.
- $30,000 saved per project by replacing manual quantity surveying with drone measurements.
- Automated painting estimates will double surveyor capacity, reducing time spent measuring projects.
→ Improved accuracy and project transparency
- Digital asset capture ensures precise area calculations, optimising resource planning and reducing paint waste.
- Customers benefit from indisputable drone data, reducing disputes over project scope and costs.
→ Enhanced safety and risk mitigation
- Drones eliminate the need for workers to climb telecom towers and rooftops, reducing risk of fall-related injuries.
- Pre-site drone inspections provide critical safety insights before crews arrive on-site.
- Remote inspections minimise exposure to extreme weather conditions, improving workforce safety and productivity.
→ Future-proofing operations with automation
- Programmed is exploring automated mowers and AI-driven inspections to expand DroneDeploy’s use.
- Plans include integrating drone task assignments into the company’s work order system, enabling fully automated maintenance workflows.
"We don’t see these as investments – we see them as immediate returns because they replace existing workflows with faster, better technology."
– Henry Arundel, CEO, Programmed Property Services
The bottom line
Programmed has successfully leveraged DroneDeploy to automate inspections, enhance safety and improve operational efficiency. By integrating reality capture technology into its workflows, the company has reduced costs, increased measurement accuracy and mitigated job site risks.
Looking ahead, Programmed plans to further expand automation and integrate drones into asset maintenance workflows, reinforcing its commitment to efficiency, safety and innovation.
To learn more about Programmed’s reality capture program, watch CEO Henry Arundel’s session at Horizons 2024 on-demand on DroneDeploy Insider.
Interested in learning how DroneDeploy can transform your asset management and site inspections? Contact us today.