Amazon is deploying an army of robots, nicknamed ‘Kiva,’ to service orders faster this Cyber Monday in the US as well as the holiday season.
More than 15,000, orange-coloured robots would be deployed by the company, with each of them weighing 320-pounds.
Kivas are capable of lifting as much as 750 pounds and have the capability to glide across Amazon’s warehouse floors by following rows of sensors.
Kiva will help workers in shipping the items faster by lifting shelves of Amazon products off the ground and speedily delivering them to employee stations. This will help reduce the time taken by workers to find items and put them into boxes.
Amazon has been incorporating high-tech technology at its fulfillment centres to increase efficiency. It acquired Massachusetts based robot-maker Kiva in 2012 for $775m in cash.
Kiva robots have already been tested on the eve of Cyber Monday at Amazon’s year-old warehouse in Tracy, California, reports latimes.com.
How well do you really know your competitors?
Access the most comprehensive Company Profiles on the market, powered by GlobalData. Save hours of research. Gain competitive edge.
Thank you!
Your download email will arrive shortly
Not ready to buy yet? Download a free sample
We are confident about the unique quality of our Company Profiles. However, we want you to make the most beneficial decision for your business, so we offer a free sample that you can download by submitting the below form
By GlobalDataThe e-commerce giant publicly unveiled the Tracy warehouse last week, which features its latest "eighth-generation" fulfillment center technology, including 3,000 Kivas.
Till now, 10 Amazon warehouses, including two in California, are classified as eighth-generation; Amazon now has 109 fulfillment centers globally, the publication reports.
Amazon senior vice president of worldwide operations and customer service Dave Clark said that Kiva enables smarter utilisation of space as it eliminates the need for wide aisles for humans to walk down.
He added that this results in stocking 50% more inventory by eighth-generation centres than older warehouses, resulting in wider selection of merchandise, fewer chances of products being out of stock and more possibilities for same-day delivery.
The robots have also cut the processing time at these centres by up to 13 minutes from well over an hour.
At other Amazon warehouses, different types of robots are operational such as Robo-Stow, a 6-ton robot that moves merchandise pallets as high as 24 feet directly onto Kiva robots, and "vision systems" that can receive an entire trailer of inventory in as little as 30 minutes by capturing an image of the trailer’s contents.
Clark also said that increased automation had no effect on hiring so far.
Amazon announced it was hiring 80,000 seasonal employees, 14% more than last year.