Amazon debuts a warehouse robot with a sense of ‘touch’

Amazon says that it has developed a caller warehouse robot, Vulcan, that tin “feel” immoderate of the items it touches.

The two-armed Vulcan, which tin maneuver goods wrong the retention compartments Amazon has successful its warehouses, uses force sensors to assistance it cognize erstwhile it makes interaction with an object. One limb rearranges items successful a compartment, portion the 2nd limb — which is equipped with a camera and suction cupful — grabs items.

Amazon says that Vulcan was trained connected carnal data, including unit and interaction feedback to prime astir 75% of Amazon’s stock, and that it’s susceptible of self-improving implicit time. The robot has been deployed successful Spokane, Washington, and Hamburg, Germany, where it has processed fractional a cardinal orders to date.

Vulcan is lone the latest summation to Amazon’s fleet of warehouse robots. It uses hundreds of thousands to fulfill lawsuit orders crossed its planetary retention facilities. While critics allege that Amazon’s robotics investments are an effort to regenerate quality workers, Amazon asserts that this isn’t the case, arguing robots similar Vulcan simply marque its warehouses safer.