Amazon is dabbling with a robot named Digit to streamline mundane tasks in its warehouses. Produced by the Oregon start-up Agility Robotics and funded by Amazon, this 5ft 9in (175cm) humanoid bot can move in various directions, crouch, and lift up to 35lb (16kg). Its initial role? Relocating empty tote boxes.
However, introducing a robot into the workspace stirs concerns amongst Amazon’s global 1.5 million employees. Tye Brady, the head technologist of Amazon Robotics, concedes that while robotics might replace certain jobs, they’ll simultaneously birth new roles. He stresses that humans remain indispensable in Amazon’s machinery.
Digit’s design relieves humans from tedious tasks, but it doesn’t signal a move towards a fully automated warehouse. In fact, Brady, addressing a media gathering in Seattle, expressed doubts about a completely robotized storage system ever becoming a reality. He emphasized the irreplaceable human capacity for higher-order thinking and problem-solving, noting that no automated system is foolproof.
Further highlighting Amazon’s vision for robots, a company blog post revealed plans for Digit to operate in unique warehouse spaces and the possibility of scaling such robotics that collaborate with humans. Concurrently, Amazon announced the launch of Sequoia, another robotic system in its Houston warehouse, aimed at expediting deliveries by identifying and storing items 75% faster, thus slashing order processing times by a quarter.
Brady, at the Seattle event, encapsulated Amazon’s philosophy: robotics should enhance human roles, not overshadow them. He compared advanced robotic systems to everyday appliances like dishwashers, stating that the best robots, like these machines, integrate seamlessly into our environments without dominating them.