After 13 years of deploying robots into its warehouses, Amazon reached a new milestone.
The tech behemoth now has 1 million robots in its warehouses, the company announced Monday. This one millionth robot was recently delivered to an Amazon fulfillment facility in Japan.
That figure puts Amazon on track to reach another landmark: Its vast network of warehouses may soon have the same number of robots working as people, according to reporting from The Wall Street Journal. The WSJ also reported that 75% of Amazon’s global deliveries are now assisted in some way by a robot.
TechCrunch reached out to Amazon for more information.
The company also announced it’s releasing a new generative AI model called DeepFleet for its warehouse robots. This AI model, which can coordinate the robots’ routes within the company’s warehouses more efficiently, will help increase the speed of its robotic fleet by 10%, according to Amazon.
The company used Amazon SageMaker — the AWS cloud studio that helps build and deploy AI models — to create DeepFleet. Amazon trained the model on its own warehouse and inventory data.
Amazon’s one millionth robot represents more than just a number. The company has improved its fleet of robots in recent years, adding new capabilities and models.
In May, the company unveiled its latest robot, Vulcan. This model has two arms, one designed for rearranging inventory and another with a camera and suction cup to grab items. Most notably, these Vulcan robots have a sense of “touch” that allows it to feel the items it is grabbing, according to Amazon.
In October 2024, the company announced its “next-generation fulfillment centers,” which would include 10x as many robots as their current facilities, in addition to human workers. The first of these new robotic-powered centers opened shortly after in Shreveport, Louisiana, near the Texas border.
Amazon originally started building up its robotic capabilities back in 2012 alongside its acquisition of Kiva Systems.
