the robots, which look like massive orange Roombas, [...] locate the stack of shelves with the needed product on it, slide beneath the stack to pick it up and then find their own routes from the stacks of stuff to human operators. And they manage to find just the right time to get themselves recharged for five minutes out of every hour. [...]
Any worker (sometimes called "pickers" in the industry jargon) can ask for anything from anywhere in the warehouse and ship it out.
"Every worker has random access to every product in the warehouse," Wurman said. [...]
As the robots pick up loads of products and put them back, they adjust the warehouse for greater efficiency. [...]
"We find that it's two to four times more efficient [than the average warehouse]," said Wurman. [...]
they know where they are by using a simple and cheap grid system that's stuck onto the floor of the warehouse.
That allows warehouse operators to switch off the lights and climate controls in the large areas of the warehouse that are patrolled solely by robots, cutting energy costs by as much as 50 percent over a standard warehouse. One marketing trick the company uses is to bring people out to the center of a warehouse and switch out the lights: The robots keep working around the people, cruising around in the dark.
the robots, which look like massive orange Roombas, [...] locate the stack of shelves with the needed product on it, slide beneath the stack to pick it up and then find their own routes from the stacks of stuff to human operators. And they manage to find just the right time to get themselves recharged for five minutes out of every hour. [...]
Any worker (sometimes called "pickers" in the industry jargon) can ask for anything from anywhere in the warehouse and ship it out.
"Every worker has random access to every product in the warehouse," Wurman said. [...]
As the robots pick up loads of products and put them back, they adjust the warehouse for greater efficiency. [...]
"We find that it's two to four times more efficient [than the average warehouse]," said Wurman. [...]
they know where they are by using a simple and cheap grid system that's stuck onto the floor of the warehouse.
That allows warehouse operators to switch off the lights and climate controls in the large areas of the warehouse that are patrolled solely by robots, cutting energy costs by as much as 50 percent over a standard warehouse. One marketing trick the company uses is to bring people out to the center of a warehouse and switch out the lights: The robots keep working around the people, cruising around in the dark.