Warehouse Efficiency Experts Are Looking to Automation
Order picking is a mundane but necessary part of supply chain operations. A forward-thinking startup robotics company is working to perfect an automated system that could revolutionize fulfillment centers in the near future.
Robots to the Rescue
In early April, Massachusetts-based RightHand Robotics introduced their RightPick platform at a supply chain event. The innovative system is aimed at improving order fulfillment in the pharmaceutical, electronics, grocery and apparel industries.
RightHand is not the first company to envision robotics as a solution for more efficient order fulfillment. The drawback was getting a robot’s mechanical “hand” to make adjustments for different sizes and types of items, but the Harvard-trained team that launched RightHand believe they have found the answer in the cloud.
How Do You “Teach” a Robot?
Current prototypes use a robotic hand with compliant “fingers” and a suction cup at the center. As the robot spends time picking random objects from a conveyor belt, data is transmitted from a camera inside its hand up to the cloud, where the information can be used to “train” other robots.
Professor Ken Goldberg of UC Berkeley, an expert on robot manipulation and learning, expressed admiration for the “clever mechanism” that RightPick has applied to the concept of robotic order-picking. For companies such as Amazon that ship a myriad of products in all shapes and sizes, RightHand could be a game-changer.
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