Amazon Nearly Has More Robots Than Humans in Warehouses

The automation of Amazon.com facilities is approaching a new milestone: There will soon be as many robots as humans.

- Sebastian Herrera

The e-commerce giant, which has spent years automating tasks previously done by humans in its facilities, has deployed more than one million robots in those workplaces, Amazon said. That is the most it has ever had and near the count of human workers at the facilities.

Company warehouses buzz with metallic arms plucking items from shelves and wheeled droids that motor around the floors ferrying the goods for packaging. In other corners, automated systems help sort the items, which other robots assist in packaging for shipment.

One of Amazon's newer robots, called Vulcan, has a sense of touch that enables it to pick items from numerous shelves. Amazon has taken recent steps to connect its robots to its order-fulfillment processes, so the machines can work in tandem with each other and with humans.

"They're one step closer to that realization of the full integration of robotics," said Reuben Scriven, research manager at Interact Analysis, a robotics consulting firm.

Now some 75% of Amazon's global deliveries are assisted in some way by robotics, the company said. The growing automation has helped Amazon improve productivity, while easing pressure on the company to solve problems such as heavy staff turnover at its fulfillment centers.

For some Amazon workers, the increasing automation has meant replacing menial, repetitive work lifting, pulling and sorting with more skilled assignments managing the machines.

"I thought I was going to be doing heavy lifting, I thought I was going to be walking like crazy," said Neisha Cruz, who spent five years picking items at an Amazon warehouse in Windsor, Conn., before she was trained to oversee robotic systems.