The logical alternative to unionizing humans and their needs is ROBOTS.
The company announced their first fully autonomously mobile robot. According to the company, the machine can autonomously navigate around a warehouse floor, pick up heavy objects, and move them to a new location.
In the fulfillment centers and sort centers, Proteus will be incorporated. Proteus won't be separated from humans by a cage or barrier. The company is going to deploy the robot in a direct manner. Proteus stops moving when a person walks in front of it's "line of sight." Hopefully the human/robot collision doesn't get added to the warehouse risk list.
The company also introduced three other new robotic features that will enter warehouses in the future. There is a robot that can lift and sort packages up to 50 pounds. The prototype of Cardinal is currently being tested by Amazon, and they are hoping to deploy the lifting and twisting box grabber to warehouses in three years.
There is a new scanning system that the company claims would allow employees to place a package on a shelf and use a barcode to check it out. Similar to the company's Just Walk Out technology, the "Amazon Robotics Identification" system keeps close tabs on a retail customer's movements through cameras and sensors and automatically charges for purchases.
There is a containerized storage system that uses robotic cranes, moving pedestals, and labeled bins to catalog, store, and retrieve items within stacks of shelfpods. According to Amazon, the system helps determine which Pod has the container with the needed product, where that container is located in the Pod, and how to grab and pull the container to an employee. The company didn't say when the new scanning or container management systems would be ready. Amazon did not reply immediately.
The human experience of being a warehouse worker is meant to be improved by these robotic innovations. The company wrote that they are constantly looking to automate to help reduce the risk of injury.
It is clear that the robots are meant to boost efficiency, to shave milliseconds off of the process of scanning a package and sending it down the shipping line. When package sorting happens earlier in the shipping process, it results in quicker process time. Amazon said that Cardinal converts batches of manual work into continuous, automated work.
Amazon warehouses have become dangerous places to work due to high quota and hyper focus on speed. Will these machines allow human workers to breathe a sigh of relief or will they add to the pressure to get things done? Will the robots allow Amazon to meet company goals with less casualties or will they be a reason for Amazon to demand more from people?
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