What if you could reduce your warehouse workforce costs by 50% or more, add 24 hour shifts that could potentially double your productivity and have instant availability to troves of up to the minute data on every aspect of your facility? Warehouse robotics systems can help you transform your business, slashing costs, supercharging productivity and amplifying performance.

Types of Warehouse Robots

Although a handful of warehouse robotics solutions have been available for decades, others are bleeding edge engineering marvels that could possibly fundamentally change the warehousing and distribution industry as we know it. The main classifications of robotics system are:

Articulated Robotic Arms: Robotic arms with multiple joints can grasp and move products in a warehouse. They're typically applied to receiving tasks, like moving products from pallets to shelving, or in production environments, for picking and shipping.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles: Unmanned aerial vehicles, conventionally referred to as drones, can deliver real-time inventory visibility in a facility through the use of RFID technology.

Automated Storage and Retrieval Systems (AS/RS) : AS/RS can pick up goods from bins and put items in their designated storage positions. Examples of AS/RS solutions are cranes that retrieve goods between aisles, vertical or horizontal carousel systems and shuttle systems.

Goods-to-Person technology (G2P): Rather than using human labor to pick items from racks and bins, G2P technology uses robots to supply items to picking stations, where workers are positioned to fulfill orders as products are delivered.

Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) : AGVs, including self-driving forklifts, carts or pallet jacks, transport goods from one location to another within a warehouse. Cart based AGVs are sometimes referred to as Automatic Guided Carts, or AGCs.

Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) : Like AGVs and AGCs, Autonomous Mobile Robots can transfer items across a facility autonomously. Unlike AGCs and AGVs, which travel predetermined routes often guided by magnetic strips or wire tracks, AMRs make use of maps, cameras and sensors to negotiate frequently changing routes by evaluating their surroundings.

Applications For Warehouse Robots

For many years, robotic applications in warehouses were confined to a small number of functions. As technology has advanced, robotic capabilities have broadened and they can now be used for almost any function in a warehouse:

Loading and unloading: Although total automation of loading and unloading trucks is not yet a possibility, automated systems like conveyors and AGVs can be added to augment your loading dock efficiency.

Palletizing and de-palletizing: Robotic systems are perfect for monotonous, recurrent work like palletizing. These types of robots typically employ a special End-of-Arm Tool to pick up units and position them on a pallet. They're frequently coupled with conveyor systems that supply products to the palletizing area.

Sorting: Robotic sortation systems must have the ability to grab products, ID them and deposit them in an appropriate bin or storage slot. As items move along a conveyor, these systems use cameras to track specific items and pick them out.

Picking: A considerable portion of the workforce expenses in a warehouse originate from picking activities, and robotic picking tehnologies have been around for decades to help tackle this problem. Nevertheless, modern robotic picking systems offer increased speed, improved accuracy, more efficiency and far better value as compared to systems of even a few years ago.

Packaging: Robotic solutions are well suited for repetitious and monotonous jobs like packaging. They may also be put to use for more complex tasks like weighing, dimensioning and cartonizing.

Transportation: Robotic transportation systems have wide-scale use in warehouses, from simple AGCs/AGVs to AMRs and conveyor systems that are integrated with AS/RS.

Storage: AS/RS solutions emoby many types of warehouse robots, including pallet shuttles, mini-load systems and cranes. AS/RS is also sometimes used in conjunction with mobile racking systems to make the most of space utilization.

Delivery: Major e-com companies are conducting research on self-driving trucks, autonomous delivery drones and other emerging tech that will fundamentally change last mile delivery options in the near future.

Replenishment: Leveraging RFID to monitor inventory, warehouse drones can survey barcode labels in half the time of manual scanning and send stock data back to the WMS instantaneously.

Industrial Robotics Companies Near Me

If you're interested in learning more about industrial robotic solutions for your operation, get in touch with an automation expert at Raymond West today!

Raymond West's Oxnard / Ventura service area includes Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark, Newbury Park, Ventura, Santa Paula, Westlake Village, Simi Valley and all surrounding areas.

Raymond West | Oxnard Material Handling Equipment Supplier

Ventura County, CA
(805) 667-0888