Right now, humans are the ones packing the items ordered, but perhaps this might not be the scenario a few years down the road. There is an upcoming robotics competition organized by Amazon’s Kiva Systems subsidiary, and this competition could be the beginning of an era where a fully robotic warehouse gets the job done, and the seeds could be sown from approximately 30 teams that had participated in this competition to see which team is able to deliver the best robot for packing a box.
Needless to say, it would be imperative for these robots to come with a degree of sensitivity, knowing just the right amount of pressure to apply when it comes to picking up one of the numerous items that are in Amazon’s inventory. After all, a fragile item is easily crushed and might be the same size as that of a bowling ball, right?