Amazon Has Made a Robot With a Sense of Touch

May 7, 2025 - By 4idiotz

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Article Summary

Amazon has developed a new warehouse robot named Vulcan that uses touch to rummage around shelves and find products. This robot is a significant advancement in making robots more skilled in tasks that require tactile ability. The new robot is already working in Amazon’s fulfillment centers in Hamburg, Germany and Spokane, Washington. Vulcan is designed to work alongside human workers, not replace them, and will help automate more of the work currently done by humans inside Amazon’s vast empire of fulfillment centers.

Original Post

Amazon has developed a new warehouse “>machine learning is key to making sense of the sensor signals and also forms part of the algorithmic loop that controls how a robot takes actions. “The special sauce we have is the software interpretation of the force torque, and how we wrap those into our control loop and into our motion plans,” he says.

Amazon revealed Vulcan at a fulfillment center in Hamburg, Germany today. The company says the robot is already working at this facility and another in Spokane, Washington.

The new robots will work on the same line as human pickers, and will aim to spare them from back-aching work by grasping more items from shelves that are high up or low down. Items that the robot decides it cannot find will be reassigned to human workers.

“Amazon stores many different products in bins, so rummaging is necessary to pull out a specific object to fill an order,” says Ken Goldberg, a roboticist at the University of California, Berkeley. “Until now this has been very difficult, so I’m curious to see the new system.”

Robot coworkers

Even so, Vulcan should help automate more of the work currently done by humans inside Amazon’s vast empire of fulfillment centers. The company has Parness says he does not foresee robots taking on all of the work done inside Amazon’s fulfillment centers. “We don’t really believe in 100 percent automation, or lights out fulfillment,” he says. “We can get to 75 percent and have robots working alongside our employees, and the sum would be greater [than either working alone].”

What This Means for You

Improved efficiency in product delivery: With the use of robots like Vulcan, product delivery can become faster and more efficient, resulting in a better customer experience.
Job redefinition: The use of robots in fulfillment centers may lead to the redefinition of some jobs, with humans and robots working together to complete tasks.
Investment in robotics technology: Companies like Amazon are investing heavily in robotics technology, indicating a growing trend in automation in various industries.
Future job market: As robots become more advanced, it is essential to consider the future job market and the possible impact on employment opportunities.