News hardware Will Proteus, Amazon’s first handling robot replace all employees?
With the automation of business tasks and the growing evolution of Artificial Intelligence, it was obvious that Amazon was working on it to create a way to make its inventory management more efficient. With more and more orders around the world and the development of several connected objects, Amazon has finally presented its first 100% autonomous handling robot.
Proteus, an independent handling robot
Optimization, optimization, optimization, these are the favorite terms of large companies like Amazon, which seeks above all to meet the needs of all their customers on time.
Resembling a small robot at ground level, Proteus is a totally autonomous mobile machine capable of transporting pallets of parcels. Amazon’s warehouses are full to bursting, and moving all the products is taking up a lot of staff time.
The goal being to optimize space and time as well as possible, Proteus is able to detect the humans around him in order to avoid accidents. Through this presentation video, Amazon unveils this prototype, as well as Cardinal, a robotic arm capable of lifting loads up to 25 kg.
The company also presents the technology called “Just Walk Out” which automatically scans packages and products that employees hold in their hands.so they no longer have to do it manually with the scanner they wear on their wrist.
Order pickers could see their way of working completely transformed, and Amazon obviously claims that these technologies are dedicated above all to facilitating tasks for the various employees of Amazon warehouses.
Changes for Amazon employees
At a time when almost half of work accidents in the United States (49% according to the Strategic Organizing Center) take place on Amazon’s handling sites, the e-commerce giant has every interest in selling these technologies for employee comfort.
After a union union in a New York warehouse, many employees have seen their workload reduced, but according to the union, the tasks are still very numerous and heavy for the employees.
Amazon’s technological innovations could fill this work overload: this is what the official post of the American giant stipulates when announcing the arrival of these different autonomous robots. The goal here is to facilitate the work of handlers, but the other side of the coin could be to want to boost sales even more, and therefore the workload.
Hoping that Amazon keeps its word on these conditions, and that the employees find their accounts there.
