Amazon puts a friendly face on its growing army of robots
With a sprawling fleet of machines that swells at a rate of up to 1,000 each day, the largest retailer in the world is also one of the largest manufacturers of industrial robots. Amazon, which employs 1.54 million humans, has deployed more than half a million robotic drive units too.
The technology giant, like many of its peers, is moving to cut costs amid rising fears of recession. Outside North America its net sales fell 5 per cent in the third quarter as inflation took its toll.
The rapid expansion of Amazon’s robotic workforce has fuelled apprehension about the impact on jobs. Surely it means employing fewer people? “I’m not so sure about that answer,” said Tye Brady, chief technologist at the group’s robotics division, who noted that it had created more than 700 new types of roles following deployment of new technology. “It’s not machines replacing people. It’s actually machines and people working together.”
Inside BOS27, a 350,000 sq ft site on the outskirts of Boston, Massachusetts, executives sought to strike a delicate balance this week between playing down concerns and drumming up excitement. “This is not science fiction,” Jason Messinger, another Amazon executive, remarked alongside Sparrow, a mechanical arm detecting, selecting and neatly slotting products into crates.
Amazon stepped up its work on warehouse robotics a decade ago when it bought Kiva Systems, a robotics start-up, for $775 million. Today the company estimates that about 75 per cent of the five billion or so packages it processes each year are handled by machines at some point.
Proteus, unveiled this summer, is designed to increase productivity. The flat, wheeled, autonomous contraption carries heavy carts of up to 800lb (360kg) and changes course when humans block its path. It uses sensors to create a live map of its surroundings and — unlike older devices — is not bound to a grid. Developers hoped people would approach Proteus as they might a farm animal, and positioned lights on the front to simulate blinking eyes and a mouth.
Each robot contraption is swiftly assembled by Amazon. They then drive themselves off for testing and charging, before parking on a wooden crate for shipment to a fulfilment centre. All in, the process takes about an hour.
Amazon was particularly excited on Thursday to show off Sparrow. Unlike its previous robotic arm systems, which only handle packaged items, this uses vacuum-based suction points to pick up products of many shapes and sizes. Executives reckon it can currently handle about 65 per cent of the 100 million products that pass through the group’s warehouses.
Amazon also continues to invest heavily in drones, and is preparing to introduce MK30 — a smaller, lighter, quieter model designed to deliver packages in as little as half an hour — into service from 2024.
Dreams of ubiquitous deliveries by air have proved difficult to get off the ground, however; for now, Amazon remains reliant on a network of drivers. After ordering 100,000 electric vans from Rivian Automotive, so far about 1,000 have hit the road.
The two companies worked very closely on creating the vehicles and Mai Le, Amazon vice-president for Last Mile (or delivery), said that Rivian “really can’t produce vans fast enough for us” as it steps up manufacturing.
Managing machines is one thing; a road-based fleet powered by humans requires a different approach. Amazon software helps drivers reach their destination as quickly as possible and addresses unsafe behaviour — such as speeding or the use of phones — in real time.
Cameras record activity inside and around vans, although Mai Le said drivers could switch them off during breaks and stressed there was no voice recording, so “I can’t hear anything” inside the vehicles. The company has told drivers not to turn off GPS tracking, she added, “because we want to make sure, are you OK?”
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