Lucas Robotics Blog entry #12 Robots and humans working together

The cavernous space in North Reading, Massachusetts, is home to Kiva Systems, makers of a state-of-the-art "mobile robotic fulfillment system." Its creations-roughly two feet square and a foot tall-are worker bees that retrieve merchandise from e-commerce warehouses. In Kiva's approach, goods are kept on portable storage units. When an order for an item arrives, battery-powered robots (called drive units) are guided by a computerized control system to fetch the order. They follow a grid system of 2D bar codes on the floor to navigate their way to mobile shelves containing the desired inventory.When the drive unit reaches the correct location on the warehouse floor, it positions itself beneath a pod and lifts it from the ground in a corkscrew action. The unit is then guided to a human packer on the periphery of the floor who takes the process over from there. The pod then picks up a pod from a previous delivery, replaces it on the floor by reversing the corkscrew action and is then free to work on another mission.