“By integrating Samsara Asset Tags, we’ve gained real-time visibility over £7.2 million worth of specialist equipment. What used to take weeks to locate is now found in minutes, allowing us to prevent theft and loss to the tune of £60,000 annually,” said Amber Kirkby, Product Owner of Samsara at Lanes Group. “It has transformed our operational efficiency by ensuring our teams always have the right tools exactly when they need them.”

Operations network just got better

Over the last two years, Samsara’s Network has doubled in density, reinforcing its position as one of the industry’s leading industrial-grade Bluetooth networks. This expansive mesh network leverages millions of Samsara-connected devices. By using industrial-grade Bluetooth signals to continuously ‘listen’ for Asset Tags, a single Asset Tag can be detected in real time.

To provide an even more comprehensive view, Samsara has integrated Hubble’s Terrestrial Network, comprised of 90M consumer smartphones. This integration builds on Samsara’s presence on roads, at job sites, and in residential areas by extending visibility into buildings.

“The integration with Hubble complements Samsara’s existing network,” said David Gal, VP of Connected Equipment at Samsara. “The Samsara Network leverages millions of gateways on assets from construction sites to motorways to rubbish trucks, while Hubble’s network uses primarily consumer smartphones, ensuring no lost or stolen asset can hide, even inside buildings. The best network in the business just got better, delivering unprecedented asset visibility.”

Intelligence delivers increased visibility and rapid asset recovery

With Samsara’s end-to-end theft and loss workflow, organisations can now detect at risk assets sooner, investigate incidents, and coordinate fast recoveries.
● Proactively identify at-risk equipment: With the new Left Behind Incident feature, managers are immediately notified when an asset is separated from its vehicle outside a trusted geofence. Rather than discovering the loss days or weeks later, customers can respond in real time to recover assets and prevent costly disruptions.
● Investigate with real-time information: Customers can mark an asset as missing and see critical context, such as photos of who last had the asset, which vehicle it was last seen with, and more, powered by StreetSense. This rich context helps determine the most efficient recovery method and allocates the resources needed for a successful retrieval.
● Rapidly recover assets and avoid lost time: Customers can coordinate quick asset recovery by dispatching a driver or sharing asset location with local authorities. Once dispatched, crews can quickly pinpoint an asset’s exact location using Compass Mode.
● Demonstrate return on investment: The new Asset Tag Overview page analyses asset photos with AI to calculate the value of assets protected and recovered. By tracking the total monetary value of assets, managers can demonstrate financial impact on the business.

Sized for equipment big and small. There’s nothing you can’t track.

The new Asset Tags are ruggedised devices engineered to operate in the most extreme and remote environments. With the compact Asset Tag and ultra-compact Asset Tag XS, equipment managers can mix and match devices based on the equipment’s size and shape.

● Asset Tag: Designed for both large and small equipment, the Asset Tag provides up to six years of maintenance-free battery life—a 50% increase over the previous generation.
● Asset Tag XS: Ideal for even smaller, high-value handheld tools or specialised equipment such as gas meters or IV pumps, the ultra-compact Asset Tag XS offers three years of battery life and flexible mounting options for the most obscure equipment.

“The scale of equipment loss in physical operations goes far beyond the cost of the tools themselves—it’s about lost productivity and project delays,” said David Gal, VP of Connected Equipment at Samsara. “To solve this, we’re doubling down on innovation, laying the foundation for new use cases. We’ve supercharged the network, the hardware, and the recovery workflow, and with the Asset Tag XS, now even the smallest assets stay within reach.”

New research reveals the multi-million dollar impact of asset loss

In physical operations, small assets play a big role in getting the job done; however, keeping track of these mission-critical tools is a growing challenge.

Research from Samsara’s forthcoming State of Connected Operations: Asset Theft & Loss report shows that in the past 12 months, 77% of organisations say a missing critical asset has resulted in a significant operational shutdown or delay. Moreover, asset shrinkage costs the average organisation without an asset tracking solution nearly £9.6 million annually, with smaller assets driving more than 70% of that cost.

The post Samsara Launches its Most Compact Asset Tag appeared first on Logistics Business.

With UK logistics companies continuing to play a critical role in European supply chains, solutions like this can help streamline operations, reduce friction at borders, and improve overall driver experience —particularly for fleets navigating evolving regulatory requirements across multiple countries.

In December 2024, a new regulatory requirement was introduced in Poland related to SENT (System for Electronic Transport Supervision) for tracking high-risk goods transported within the country. In regard to this, a project to validate one of AiDENS services/products within the platform was initiated. This was done in a project with Volvo Trucks through CampX, Volvo Group’s global innovation arena for technology and business transformation.

It was a successful project leading to high value for the fleet owner and truck drivers enabling seamless compliance with Poland’s SENT without the need for external GPS devices or aftermarket installations. Due to the successful outcomes from the initial project, another phase is now initiated with Volvo Trucks to evaluate further commercial markets during 2026.

We asked Niclas Gyllenram, CEO of AiDEN Auto, to explain further:

How does AiDEN’s integration with Volvo Trucks address regulatory compliance challenges that are comparable to those faced by UK fleet operators, particularly in areas like customs, cabotage, and emissions reporting?

What we’ve demonstrated with SENT in Poland is that compliance can be embedded directly into the vehicle, rather than managed as a separate operational burden. While the UK has its own regulatory landscape — whether that’s post-Brexit customs processes, emissions zones, or cabotage rules — the underlying challenge is the same: fragmented systems and manual workflows. Our approach is to unify those requirements into a single, in-vehicle interface that automates data capture and reporting. That reduces errors, improves traceability, and ultimately gives operators more confidence that they are compliant without adding complexity to their day-to-day operations.

The UK logistics sector is dealing with increasing operational complexity post-Brexit—how could a built-in, OEM-native compliance solution like AiDEN’s help reduce administrative burden and cross-border friction for UK hauliers?

Post-Brexit, UK operators are navigating a much more complex cross-border environment, with additional documentation, checks, and reporting obligations. Traditionally, this has meant more paperwork, more devices, and more time spent managing compliance rather than moving goods. By embedding compliance into the truck itself, we remove much of that friction. Data is captured automatically, reporting can be handled in real time, and drivers don’t need to interact with multiple systems. That translates into fewer delays at borders, fewer compliance risks, and a more streamlined operation overall.

Given that the initial use case focuses on Poland’s SENT regulation, what lessons from this deployment are most relevant for the UK market, where digital compliance requirements are also evolving?

One of the key lessons is that operators don’t want more tools — they want fewer, better-integrated ones. In Poland, the biggest value came from eliminating the need for external GPS devices and separate applications, while still meeting strict regulatory requirements. That principle applies equally in the UK. As digital compliance frameworks evolve, success will depend on how seamlessly these requirements can be integrated into existing workflows. If compliance becomes invisible — something that just happens in the background — then adoption becomes much easier and the value becomes immediate.

UK fleets often rely on a mix of legacy systems and aftermarket solutions—how significant is the shift toward fully integrated, in-vehicle compliance tools in terms of cost savings, uptime, and driver experience?

It’s a fundamental shift. Aftermarket solutions typically introduce additional hardware, installation time, maintenance, and points of failure. They also create a fragmented experience for drivers, who may need to manage multiple devices or interfaces. By moving to an OEM-native solution, you eliminate those layers. There’s no additional hardware cost, no installation downtime, and far fewer integration challenges. From a driver’s perspective, everything is accessible through a familiar interface. From an operator’s perspective, that means lower total cost of ownership and improved fleet uptime.

From a broader transportation perspective, how do you see embedded compliance and connectivity platforms reshaping fleet management, safety, and operational efficiency across the UK logistics ecosystem?

We see this as part of a broader transition toward software-defined vehicles. Compliance is just one entry point, but once you have a secure, connected platform in the vehicle, you can layer in additional services— everything from safety features to operational analytics. For UK fleets, that means moving from reactive management to real-time, data-driven decision-making. It improves safety by ensuring regulatory adherence, enhances efficiency through better visibility, and creates opportunities to optimize routes, reduce emissions, and improve overall performance.

Following the successful proof-of-value project with Volvo Trucks and the planned evaluation of additional commercial markets in 2026, what are AiDEN’s priorities for expansion into the UK and other European markets, and what criteria determine where you scale next?

The success of the initial project has validated both the technology and the business case, which is why we are now moving into the next phase to evaluate additional markets. Our expansion strategy is guided by a few key factors: the level of regulatory complexity, the digital maturity of the market, and the presence of strong OEM and fleet partnerships. The UK is naturally a market of interest because of its scale and the operational challenges fleets are facing today. Ultimately, our goal is to bring the same value we’ve demonstrated in Poland — simplifying compliance and reducing operational friction — to fleets across Europe, adapting to each market’s specific regulatory environment while maintaining a consistent, integrated user experience.

The post Compliance Software for UK CV Fleets in Europe appeared first on Logistics Business.

After more than two decades of pioneering cube storage automation, AutoStore is now moving beyond automation alone toward intelligent fulfillment systems that continuously sense, decide, and improve in real time. The announcement reflects a shift in the market from asset-centric automation to decision-centric fulfillment, as companies look to connect machines, software, data, and people into more intelligent, coordinated operations. With CubeVerse and AutoStore Intelligence, AutoStore enables better, faster decisions across design, deployment, operations, and optimization—working alongside existing WMS and WES solutions rather than replacing them.

For customers, this means unlocking hidden capacity in existing systems, simplifying operations, and accelerating the path to fully autonomous fulfillment, powered by learnings continuously drawn from AutoStore’s global community of thousands of live systems, enabling improvements that compound across the installed base.

“Fulfillment is becoming a real-time, intelligence-driven discipline. If systems can’t sense, decide, and adapt continuously, everything upstream breaks,” said Parth Joshi, Chief Product Officer at AutoStore. “With the launch of the CubeVerse platform and our AI-driven capabilities, we’re bringing intelligence across the entire lifecycle — from design to daily operations to advanced analytics to optimizations. This is a major first step in our AI strategy and reinforces our focus on innovation as the market leader in automated fulfillment.”

The Spring 2026 product announcement introduces a new CubeVerse cloud platform, designed to unify data, applications, and AI capabilities across the fulfillment lifecycle, alongside AI-powered software and analytics, and expanded automation capabilities. Together, these capabilities lower total cost of ownership, improve performance and predictability, reduce operational complexity, and support longer operating hours, including full 24/7 operation.

After a decade of rapid investment in warehouse automation, the industry is facing a new challenge:
seventy-five percent of companies say synchronizing their supply chain is difficult as logistics networks grow more complex. The question is no longer just how to automate, but how to coordinate machines, software, data, and people into systems that make better decisions and run reliably around the clock.
CubeVerse and AutoStore Intelligence provide the data, simulation, and analytics capabilities that enable this shift — helping customers orchestrate fulfillment decisions across the system lifecycle without replacing existing orchestration or control layers.

The Spring 2026 Product Portfolio

Built on the CubeVerse platform, this Spring’s announcements span the fulfillment lifecycle—from system design and AI-driven optimization to autonomous order preparation.

CubeVerse Platform
CubeVerse provides a single platform to design, deploy, and run AutoStore systems. It spans the full system lifecycle—from design and simulation to deployment, operations, analytics, and optimization.
CubeVerse simplifies integrations, keeps operations consistent across sites, and helps customers avoid overbuilding and keep costs under control.

AutoStore Intelligence
AutoStore Intelligence applies built-in AI to real operational data across the platform to orchestrate fulfillment in real time. It optimizes robot movement through CubeControl, reduces congestion, and clears traffic bottlenecks to deliver significantly higher throughput during peak periods, with
performance continuously improving over time, without requiring additional robots or grid
expansion. Embedded across CubeVerse, AutoStore Intelligence uses 20+ proprietary models to predict issues, optimize operations, and deliver measurable performance improvements across the automation lifecycle.

CubeAnalytics
CubeAnalytics, powered by AutoStore Intelligence, turns system data into clear, real-time insights and recommended actions. It helps teams identify issues earlier, reduce downtime, and rely less on specialized in-house expertise. With built-in AI, CubeAnalytics automatically surfaces key issues and patterns, evolving from reporting into an intelligent system that recommends action automatically.

CubeControl
CubeControl, powered by AutoStore Intelligence, uses AI to personalize routing parameters and create optimized robot highways for large, robot-dense grids. This improves traffic flow, reduces congestion, and boosts overall system throughput without additional hardware.

VersaAI
VersaAI delivers robotic piece picking powered by vision and AI, expanding AutoStore’s automation portfolio into autonomous order preparation. The system automates order preparation, consolidation, and staging, improving overall AutoStore utilization. It enables operations to run longer hours with consistent throughput and lower cost per order. This supports 24/7 operations without sacrificing performance.

CubeStudio
First major application added to the CubeVerse platform, CubeStudio is a shared, cloud-based environment for system design, simulation, and validation, enabling AutoStore and partners to make data-led decisions together. It serves as an early proof point of AutoStore’s modern app strategy powered by CubeVerse.

Cube Enhancements
New workstation layouts and expanded bin and case support give customers more flexibility as volumes, SKUs, and workflows change, without requiring grid rebuilds. Enhancements based on partner and customer feedback include expanded case support in AutoCase, simplified WMS integration through VersaPort, and upgraded industrial PCs for large, high-performance systems.

The post CubeVerse Platform Launched for Fulfilment appeared first on Logistics Business.

“I am glad that we now have signed an agreement with Witron for automation in the logistics centre that we will establish. This solution will give us a more flexible, efficient and sustainable logistics chain for product supply to our stores in the southern parts of Sweden, thereby strengthening the entire Axfood family’s competitiveness,” comments Simone Margulies, President and CEO of Axfood.

Logical next step

“It feels very good to have the agreement in place for this strategically important automation solution. With the experience we have built together with Witron in Bålsta, we know that this technology will give us the right conditions going forward, and as a natural step, we feel confident in continuing this journey also in southern Sweden. This investment is fundamental in strengthening Dagab’s and Axfood’s future logistics structure, and for continuing to deliver on our ambition of market-leading efficiency,” says Hans Bax, Managing Director of Dagab.

High level of automation across all temperature zones

In Kungsbacka, products will be stored and picked across three temperature zones: ambient goods (+18 °C), fresh goods (+2 °C), and frozen items (-26 °C). As in Bålsta, the solution relies on standardized Witron logistics modules, including Order Picking Machinery (OPM with a total of 37 COMs), All-in-One (AIO), the Car Picking System (CPS), and a fully automated shipping buffer. Within this shipping buffer, store-friendly picked and consolidated order pallets are buffered and provided just-in-time on heavy-duty lanes, sequenced by delivery route for efficient truck loading. In addition, the Goods-to-Person (GTP) solution enables ergonomic semi-automated picking operations in the frozen food area.

High-performance warehouse management system

The overall material flow includes more than 500,000 storage locations for wooden and plastic pallets, roll containers, totes, and refrigerated containers, 111 stacker cranes, as well as 16+ kilometers of conveyor technology. All processes are controlled by a multifunctional warehouse management system with open interfaces from the WMS to the customer’s supplier systems, route scheduling systems, and sales systems. This enables a high level of end-to-end optimization across Axfood’s entire internal and external supply chain. A Witron OnSite service team of more than 60 employees ensures consistently high system availability in multi-shift operation around the clock – 365 days a year.

Successful omnichannel project

Both companies can reflect positively on a jointly and successfully implemented project. Since early 2025, following a phased ramp-up, one of the most innovative logistics centres in the retail industry has been operating at full capacity in Bålsta, around 40 kilometers northwest of Stockholm. Axfood and Witron designed and realized a cutting-edge omnichannel distribution centre that supplies stores as well as end customers via click + collect and home delivery. The highly automated system handles a product range of 22,000+ dry, fresh, and frozen items.

The post Another Full-range Distribution Centre in Sweden appeared first on Logistics Business.

The project targets one of the most sensitive points in fashion logistics: final order validation after picking and just before shipment to wholesale customers and retail networks. While picking operations were already supported by pick‑to‑light systems, final verification still relied heavily on manual checks, making it difficult to detect discrepancies before shipments left the facility.

In the U.S. fashion industry, these discrepancies carry a direct financial impact. Chargebacks caused by missing or excess items are among the most common penalties imposed by retailers, often reaching up to 20% of the invoice value and resulting in losses that can amount to tens of thousands of dollars per shipment.

To eliminate this risk, Perry Ellis implemented high-density RFID tunnels fully integrated into its existing conveyor lines. The solution automatically validates the contents of each open box after picking, comparing in real time the items detected by RFID with the expected order data.

The system combines Clustag MOT Station RFID tunnels, capable of processing up to 1,000 boxes per hour and reading up to 600 items per box, with Cognex barcode readers for box identification. Interroll automated rejection lines that divert non compliant shipments without interrupting operational flow.

The entire process is orchestrated by Zentup, Clustag’s middleware platform, fully integrated with Perry Ellis’ Manhattan WMS, ensuring real time EPC level validation and allowing only compliant orders to proceed to shipping. The entire process is orchestrated by Zentup, Clustag’s middleware platform, fully integrated with Perry Ellis’ Manhattan WMS, ensuring real‑time EPC‑level validation and allowing only compliant orders to proceed to shipping.

One of the challenges was deploying the RFID solution in a live production environment under tight timelines and complex installation conditions, including work on mezzanines over 12 meters high. Despite these constraints, the RAIN system was implemented without interrupting daily operations or reducing throughput.

The results were immediate. Since go‑live, Perry Ellis has achieved a 17% reduction in discrepancies detected after the RFID tunnels, along with a significant decrease in non‑compliant shipments reaching B2B customers. This has translated into substantial savings in chargeback penalties and improved product availability at stores, ensuring the correct sizes, colours, and styles arrive at the point of sale.

“This project shows how RFID technology can transform fashion intralogistics from day one,” says Jorge Robledillo, Director of Clustag North America. “Strong collaboration between teams was essential to delivering measurable results in a highly demanding operational environment.”

According to Tom Seow, VP of Distribution Engineering at Perry Ellis, “the RFID tunnel solutions, integrated with Zentup, allow us to detect errors before they reach the store and give us a clear competitive advantage. We will continue investing in these systems for future projects.”

With this deployment, Perry Ellis reinforces its intralogistics digitalization strategy and demonstrates how automated post‑picking validation with RFID tunnels has become a key tool for reducing financial risk, improving operational efficiency, and meeting the high standards of U.S. retail operations.

This success story will be featured by Clustag at MODEX 2026, where the company will exhibit from April 13 to 16 in Atlanta (Booth B17332). The event will serve as a platform to discuss with U.S. customers and partners how RAIN RFID solutions can be successfully integrated into highly automated intralogistics environments and how these projects are setting a new benchmark for B2B fashion distribution in North America.

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Available for ‘ANT driven’ AGVs and AMRs, SmartPass is a robust, safe, and highly configurable technology that meets the core efficiency goal of obstacle avoidance without the drawbacks of traditional AMRs. SmartPass suits all types of automated vehicles and industrial sites.

No matter how clean a site, and how well trained its staff, the paths of mobile robots sometimes become blocked… AGVs typically manage this situation by sending an alarm to an operator, while AMRs take any route possible, without limitation. The first can lead to transport delays, the second to traffic deadlocks. SmartPass effectively bridges the gap between the two.

commented BlueBotics’ CEO, Dr. Nicola Tomatis.

Bridging the gap between AGVs & AMRs

SmartPass enables automated vehicles to follow virtual paths most of the time — for efficient, robust, and repeatable operation — while performing pragmatic obstacle avoidance maneuvers when blockages are detected.

“Rather than layering basic traffic management over obstacle avoidance functionality — which AMR producers have attempted with limited results — SmartPass does the opposite,” Tomatis explained. “It adds smart, configurable obstacle avoidance to ANT navigation’s default ‘virtual path follower’ mode. This ensures the powerful traffic management features of our ANT server fleet manager are also applied to SmartPass maneuvers.”

Three key SmartPass benefits

ANT’s SmartPass function offers three key benefits that together are unique in the mobile robot industry:

1. Efficiency-focused movement
   • Vehicles using SmartPass take the shortest route around an obstacle — within pre-configured limits — before returning immediately to their virtual path.
   • SmartPass-enabled vehicles also move faster than traditional AMRs. Travelling at optimal speeds and with optimal acceleration, they follow virtual paths and respect clear traffic rules most of the time, switching to slower, more reactive speeds only when needed.
   • Vehicle actions like moving forks and communicating with equipment take place during SmartPass maneuvers, saving time versus the more common sequential approach.
   • SmartPass maneuvers are blocked near pick/drop points to guarantee precision.
2. Minimizes deadlocks
   • By managing the movements of vehicles within the ANT server’s existing traffic management framework, SmartPass guarantees that vehicles only avoid obstacles when there is no risk of blocking another robot, minimizing the chance of deadlocks.
   • Vehicles only move around objects and never around other vehicles, a further cause of deadlocks.
3. Fully configurable
   • SmartPass can be configured to suit every user’s site and operational needs. Customers can define, for example, the maximum distance a vehicle is allowed to travel from its virtual path; the areas (and even individual routes) of a site where SmartPass cannot be used; and vehicle-specific parameters such as the exact distance to stop before an obstacle.

“SmartPass doesn’t allow robots to roam freely, and it is built from the ground up on ANT server’s powerful traffic management, virtually eliminating the chance of deadlocks,” Tomatis added. “We are confident this safe, prudent approach best meets the needs of industrial customers looking to deploy AGVs and AMRs in what are often high-traffic locations.”

SmartPass is available now for vehicle makers, system integrators, and end users deploying ‘ANT driven’ AGVs/AMRs managed by BlueBotics’ ANT server fleet manager.

The post AMR/AGV Obstacle Avoidance Software appeared first on Logistics Business.

At the International Robot Exhibition in Tokyo humanoids stole the show once again. Machines that walk, grip, and gesture like us have an undeniable magnetism, part science fiction promise, part genuine engineering marvel. Yet behind the spectacle, logistics leaders are asking whether these machines deliver demonstrable ROI, or if the industry is chasing a compelling idea that cannot yet scale.

Investment banks are certainly bullish. Morgan Stanley forecasts a global humanoid robot market worth $5 trillion by 2050, with deployment rates eventually reaching one machine for every ten humans. Those forecasts may well prove directionally right over decades. But logistics buyers don’t invest on 2050 narratives, they invest based on what can be deployed, integrated, and scaled in the next 12–24 months.

Innovation is only real when scaled

I’ve had countless conversations with CEOs in this industry who express frustration about being trapped in endless pilots and struggling to achieve meaningful traction. The pattern is familiar; exciting technology, impressive demonstrations, but no clear path to the kind of measurable, referenceable customer value that drives genuine adoption. What’s changed in warehouse automation is that customers are no longer rewarding novelty, they’re rewarding repeatable, referenceable outcomes delivered fast, in brownfield sites, under real volatility.

While there has become a hyperfocus on humanoids, most of the attention is driven by the fact that they generate a big reaction. We live in a world where reaction doesn’t equate to return on investment. Tim Tetzlaff, Global Head of Digital Transformation at DHL, captured this dynamic perfectly when he said: “Innovation is only real when scaled. Otherwise, it’s just a nice idea.” Too many robotics companies have compelling ideas but struggle to scale effectively, missing the chance to create meaningful customer impact. In practice, the winners in this cycle are the firms that scale through software-defined flexibility, not the ones chasing the most cinematic demo.

There’s a real risk that funding will dry up as ambitions collide with reality. Training robots through thousands of hours of simulation can produce impressive physical capabilities, but it grants them little genuine understanding of how the real world actually works. Warehouses are messy, stochastic environments: congestion, mixed Stock Keeping Units (SKUs), shifting priorities, human variability, and peak swings that don’t show up in lab conditions. Physical AI only becomes meaningful when systems learn from millions of real tasks in production. Purpose-built fleets do that every day, they don’t just learn how to move, they learn how the operation actually behaves. Purpose-built warehouse robots accumulate vast operational experience in the environments they are designed to serve. They know the warehouse floor because they have worked it.

The Gap Between Demo and Deployment

This gap between demonstration and deployment is the crux of the matter. Promotional videos may show humanoids performing acrobatic feats, but none can yet walk into an unfamiliar warehouse and reliably execute the complex, repetitive tasks that drive logistics operations. The most advanced humanoid models on the market today are still positioned as research platforms rather than production ready solutions. Production environments don’t just need a capable robot, they need an orchestration layer that can integrate with Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), and Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES), balance priorities in real time, and keep performance stable through peak periods.

As such, I expect 2026 to bring a wave of consolidation across the robotics sector, as companies locked into humanoid development face mounting pressure to demonstrate tangible commercial value. We’ll see the hype start to fade as customers and investors demand real world results, creating an environment where only the purpose built will survive.

The Opportunity in Front of Us

Here’s the reality that often gets lost in the humanoid excitement, we estimate that less than ten percent of warehouses globally have sufficient levels of automation today. The opportunity isn’t to build robots that look like humans. It’s to build the right solutions for the right tasks. That’s also why flexible automation is winning: operators want capability they can deploy in weeks, scale up or down, and reconfigure when volumes or product mix shift. In a world of uncertainty, adaptability is the real throughput advantage.

At Locus Robotics, we’ve moved beyond Person-to-Goods automation to define an entirely new category: Robots-to-Goods. Robots can now autonomously pick, move, and replenish inventory, performing tasks that previously required multiple human touches. But the hardware is only one piece of the puzzle. The real breakthrough comes from integrating Agentic AI with Physical AI to create systems that sense, decide, and act as one. The value isn’t one heroic robot, it’s a software-defined operation that keeps improving because it learns from the work. Warehouses become cohesive ecosystems rather than disconnected islands of automation.

The Financial Times suggests Japan, with its shrinking population and cultural openness to robotics, could become one of the first major democracies to experiment with widescale humanoid adoption. Perhaps. But for logistics leaders making investment decisions today, the question is not whether humanoid robots are impressive, they unquestionably are, but whether they can deliver the demonstrable, referenceable ROI that operations demand. Purpose built robotics already can and already do.

The post Humanoid Hype? Get Real appeared first on Logistics Business.

Rainforest Distribution chose Manhattan Active Supply Chain Planning to modernise its demand planning, forecasting, and replenishment processes, all on a single unified, cloud-native platform. By moving away from fragmented legacy tools to a single planning solution, Rainforest will gain real-time visibility and continuously balance service levels, cost, and capacity across its network, while responding faster to changing customer demand.

“As our business continues to scale, the complexity of our supply chain has increased exponentially,” said Alexander Ridings, CEO, Rainforest Distribution.

“We needed a modern planning solution that could keep pace with that growth, give our teams a single, trusted view of demand and inventory, and help us serve customers with greater reliability. Manhattan Active Supply Chain Planning gives us the unified, intelligent platform we were looking for to align our planners, our operations, and our strategic growth ambitions.”

“Rainforest Distribution operates in an environment where agility, accuracy, and responsiveness are critical,” said Stewart Gantt, executive vice president of Global Services, Manhattan Associates. “We are excited to partner with them on this transformation to help them unlock new levels of efficiency and build a more resilient, data-driven supply chain.”

Manhattan Active Supply Chain Planning aligns planning and execution around a shared strategy, helping organisations eliminate systemic and operational silos and drive coordinated, enterprise-wide decision-making. Built on Manhattan’s cloud-native, microservices-based Manhattan Active® Platform, the solution is engineered to adapt in real time to shifts in demand, labour, orders, and capacity, aligning planning functions with execution across distribution and transportation operations.

The post Food & Beverage Supply Chain Planning appeared first on Logistics Business.

Pallets form the backbone of logistics, enabling the transport of goods worldwide in countless processes. Over the course of their life cycle, they often travel hundreds of thousands of kilometers and carry heavy loads — wear and tear is therefore unavoidable. The consequences of damaged pallets can vary greatly depending on the severity of the damage: protruding parts, the possible collapse of loads, or impaired machine capability and transport safety due to severely damaged pallets are risks that can cause major disruptions to logistics processes, complete operational shutdowns, or transport damage. Damage to goods may also lead customers to refuse acceptance. Logistics companies naturally want to avoid financial losses, such as potential penalties, scrap, or costly repairs, wherever possible.

For this reason, empty pallets are repeatedly inspected during pallet exchange — however, this is usually done manually, explains Dr. Michael Kleinkes, one of the founders and Managing Director of breeze innovations GmbH based in Haltern am See: “These inspections are physically demanding and often subjective, which frequently leads to discussions during the handover of inspected and classified empty pallets.”

Kleinkes and his partner wanted to fundamentally change this situation. “Our goal was to develop a classification system that allows the condition of pallets to be assessed fully automatically, fast, reliably, reproducibly, and above all objectively, with minimal effort,” says Kleinkes. With breeze-PAVE, such a solution is now available to the pallet market.

Hybrid Sensor Technology Creates Digital Twins

The innovative system makes it possible to capture key pallet characteristics including the condition of each individual pallet component, color, brightness, and 3D dimensions, thus enabling the best possible assessment of pallet quality. The reliable classification of both colour and brightness is extremely important: many pooling companies mark their own pallet inventory with a dedicated colour to distinguish them more easily from rental pallets operated by competitors. Brightness detection plays a key role in the classification of exchange pallets. When checking component dimensions — deck boards, stringer boards, cross boards, and blocks — breeze-PAVE detects whether these elements comply with the specified geometric dimensions and required positions. If they do not, the corresponding areas are marked, and the pallet’s quality rating is downgraded.

Breeze relies on a multi-sensor system for data acquisition, explains Kleinkes: “Pallets are scanned by breeze-PAVE in motion from all directions: top, bottom, sides, front, and rear using multiple laser sensors, while brightness is checked simultaneously. This combination allows us to achieve complete 360-degree scanning of the real objects, providing a solid basis for assessing the condition of the new and used pallets being inspected.” The system also reliably detects chemical residues and contamination such as oil, paint, or adhering cardboard.

From the captured information, a digital twin is created, which breeze-PAVE then analyzes in detail using software. In this step, deviations from predefined quality characteristics are automatically detected, the pallet is classified, and clearly classified into quality grades A, B, C, or ‘defective.’ The evaluation profiles can be flexibly adapted to the user’s specifications and cover both common load carrier standards such as EPAL, as well as individual, customer-specific requirements.

“In addition, the software enables users to achieve customer-specific pallet classification using configurable parameter sets that are independent of common standards,” explains Kleinkes. “This has the advantage that individual profiles can be created for any customer and selected at the push of a button in the software. This makes it possible to meet customer requirements in the best possible way.”

Over 1,000 Pallets per Hour

Compared to manual pallet inspection, breeze-PAVE offers a range of advantages. The most important feature of the system is the objectivity of the automated process, which significantly increases process reliability. Another major advantage is the system’s exceptional accuracy and speed: during operation, it captures several million 3D measurement points per pallet without impacting cycle time, evaluates them in less than one second, and detects not only obvious damage but even the smallest deviations.

This impressive performance currently enables a throughput of well over 1,000 pallets per hour per system. These pallets can be inspected during normal operation — on the fly, without stopping the load carriers. Especially in high-throughput processes, this results in enormous savings in time and labour.

“Based on the evaluation time, we could theoretically inspect up to 4,000 pallets per hour per system — but this rate cannot be realized with current conveyor technology. The precision and speed of breeze-PAVE are absolutely unattainable for the human eye,” emphasizes Kleinkes.

Another strength of breeze-PAVE is its ease of integration into existing conveyor and sorting systems. It requires only 1.5 meters of installation space above the conveyor technology and a gap of around 25 centimeters in the conveyor line. Alternatively, breeze also offers a complete solution with its own conveyor technology. If required, the system control can also be integrated into existing control cabinets.

Optimized Digital Load Carrier Management

According to Kleinkes, full integration into digital load carrier management systems represents an important milestone toward the digitalization of logistics processes: “For every pallet inspected, breeze-PAVE generates an online report that can be evaluated according to various criteria, such as shipments, quality grades, or locations. If desired, the captured data is transmitted directly to the cloud and made available to the user in real time. This enables transparent, cross-site monitoring of pallet quality and, for example, long-term observation of the quality of a specific customer’s pallets over months. For modern logistics processes, this technology is a central building block and a decisive step toward digitalized load carrier management.”

Moreover, breeze-PAVE is not limited to wooden pallets but can inspect all types of load carriers, such as plastic pallets, mesh boxes, loaded containers or packaged goods. Information such as dimensions, volume, overhangs, or deformations of such objects is precisely captured and digitally evaluated by the system. “In this development, we initially focused on wooden pallets, but based on our many years of experience in automation, we are able to use it as a flexible platform for individual customer solutions and adapt it to the respective requirements,” says Kleinkes.

According to him, the system’s capabilities go far beyond merely classifying empty or loaded load carriers: “With breeze-PAVE, we can digitize virtually anything—from reusable drinking cups to large objects — and are able to detect any kind of geometric shape or positional deviation in virtually any object. At present, however, we are focusing on pallets and are already working on additional solutions in this area, such as automated material monitoring in the repair process. This allows the costs incurred per repaired batch to be automatically tracked and invoiced.”

Economically Attractive Solution

The system developed by breeze innovations has a high technological standard and is based on established sensor and software technologies. According to Kleinkes, the purchase costs of the classification system are amortized within a short time: “Saved staff costs, high availability even during staff shortages, illness, or vacation, reduced misclassifications and avoided returns, as well as the reliable detection of counterfeit pallets — which are increasingly causing problems in logistics — make breeze-PAVE an economically attractive solution. Companies that inspect or sort large quantities of pallets every day benefit enormously from this innovation.”

For employees, day-to-day operations remain almost unchanged: pallets continue to be fed, removed, or routed to repair as usual, depending on the classification result. What is new, however, is that breeze-PAVE fully automates the previously manual inspection of pallet quality and provides an objective classification evaluation in less than one second. For every delivery process, a digital quality report is available via a web server and can be displayed on any device with a web browser. Warehouse staff and truck drivers thus receive an immediate, transparent overview of the load composition and the condition of the pallets at a glance. With the objective results of breeze-PAVE in the form of transparent reports, discussions about pallet quality at the loading dock are now a thing of the past.

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At the heart of Atomix’s solution is its ‘1+4’ technology platform. The ‘1’ refers to Atomixer, an AI-native orchestration software platform that enables real-time coordination of heterogeneous robotic fleets while integrating seamlessly with existing WMS/WCS systems.

The ‘4’ represents Atomix’s four families of self-developed robotics, including 4-way pallet shuttles, pallet AMRs, and tote Storage Transfer Robots and Tote AMRs, designed for high-density storage, flexible handling, and efficient picking. These technologies are modularly combined into three subsystem solutions — ‘Storage Mix’, ‘Handling Mix’, and ‘Picking Mix’ — allowing system integrators to configure scalable automation systems tailored to specific warehouse needs.

A key differentiator of Atomix is its ability to orchestrate heterogeneous robotic fleets within the same environment. Powered by advanced AI algorithms such as MAPF and decentralized deadlock avoidance, Atomixer enables seamless collaboration between different robot types and third-party equipment, optimizing warehouse operations in real time.

Demo Centre

Globally, Atomix works through a partner-based delivery model, providing core technologies and products while local system integrators deliver project implementation and lifecycle services. With over 500 projects across 20+ countries, Atomix has built long-term partnerships with companies including Coca-Cola, Nestlé, Toyota, Yum China, Lotte, ITW, and Lenovo, achieving a 71% customer renewal rate.

In Europe, Atomix continues to expand through local integrator partnerships. The company has recently opened a Demo & Experience Centre in Belgium to support partners and customers across the region. Recent projects delivered in Romania and Greece demonstrate the flexibility of Atomix solutions across industries such as manufacturing and cold-chain logistics.

Visitors to LogiMAT 2026 are invited to meet the Atomix team to explore AI-powered automation solutions and discuss partnership opportunities. If you would like a free visitor ticket you can register here.

The post AI-Driven Warehouse Automation at LogiMAT appeared first on Logistics Business.