Warehouse & Logistics Robotics

A.P. Moller-Maersk has taken over management of Puma's three large, highly automated distribution centers in the United States and turned them into multi-client facilities, with Puma letting Maersk rent out unused space to other companies. Under the contract logistics agreement for North America, Maersk will operate warehouses in Torrance, California; Phoenix; and Whitestown, Indiana, outside Indianapolis, totaling about 2.3 million square feet. Puma said outsourcing its U.S. distribution network to Maersk will help maximize the performance of its automated facilities, speed up order processing and reduce costs while supporting retail stores, wholesale customers and online shoppers. The three centers are equipped with AutoStore robotic storage and retrieval systems, and the Torrance facility will become Maersk North America's first AutoStore deployment supporting multiple clients, with capacity for other brands starting in 2027 and the ability to handle roughly 20 million units of throughput each year. Maersk North America operates more than 70 warehouses covering about 22.5 million square feet, and globally Maersk has more than 500 warehouses under management.

Toyota Motor Corporation estimates that modernizing its factories could require about 1 trillion yen, or $6.4 billion, annually from 2028, covering Toyota, group companies, and major suppliers. The company told investors that roughly 400,000 robots, including humanoid and conventional machines, could be needed to replace existing equipment and add new automation capabilities, spanning industrial robots, automated logistics, and human-robot collaboration. Toyota has not committed to spending the full amount or specified how long the investment would continue. The figure would be roughly three times Toyota's FY2026 additions to fixed assets of 1.88 trillion yen, though it includes group companies and major suppliers and is therefore not directly comparable with Toyota's consolidated capital spending. Toyota generated 4.74 trillion yen in operating cash flow in FY2026, and its operating margin declined to 7.4% in FY2026 from 10.0% in FY2025 and 11.9% in FY2024. Hyundai plans to deploy humanoid robots at a U.S. plant from 2028, while Chinese automakers including BYD, Geely and Chery continue to pressure Toyota's joint ventures in China.

Tractor Supply Company has opened its 11th distribution center, an 865,000-square-foot facility in Nampa, Idaho, representing a US$200,000,000-plus investment that will support 500 full-time jobs. The site will initially serve 123 stores across nine states, with capacity to reach more than 200 locations. It is the first facility in Tractor Supply's network to integrate KNAPP automated storage and retrieval technology alongside an on-site AI Innovation Team, embedding automation and sustainability investments directly into the company's supply chain backbone. The opening comes against the backdrop of Tractor Supply's Q2 2026 update, in which sales grew modestly while net income declined and net margins compressed from the prior year. The company's narrative projects $18.0 billion in revenue and $1.2 billion in earnings by 2029, requiring 4.6% yearly revenue growth, while some of the lowest analysts assume only about 3.3% annual revenue growth to roughly US$17.4 billion and worry that rising distribution and delivery costs could outweigh the Nampa automation efficiency gains.

Amazon is adding a new manufacturing site in Greenwood, Indiana, with more than $100 million earmarked for the project as it expands domestic production of equipment used across its logistics and robotics operations. The planned building will cover 585,000 square feet and is targeted to start operating by 2028, producing equipment for Amazon's fulfillment and robotics network across North America. Amazon expects the project to create 300 skilled positions spanning manufacturing, engineering, quality control and program management, with average annual compensation for the new workforce expected to approach $100,000. The investment adds to Amazon's manufacturing footprint in Indiana, where the company said it has committed more than $40 billion since 2008 and supports over 27,000 direct jobs, and it cited more than $230 billion invested in U.S. manufacturing since 2010. Amazon is also expanding robotics production elsewhere in the country, including a Texas project unveiled in August, while operating two robotics manufacturing sites in Massachusetts. AMZN shares were down 1% in morning trading Thursday.

YardFlow is expanding its yard automation software to all 200-plus facilities of a beverage giant after an initial 26-site deployment. According to a YardFlow analysis, the shipper moved nearly 5% more freight with the same headcount, which founder Jake Koppinger told FreightWaves represents tens of millions of dollars of incremental profit. The customer is rolling the system out from its largest facilities down to its smallest to achieve standardization, Koppinger said. YardFlow has processed close to 2 million shipments across the 26 sites, and the system runs at 99.9% uptime. The company's core product digitizes the driver journey from gate check-in through dock assignment to check-out and signed documentation, and the customer has also asked for a yard management system that YardFlow built and is now deploying, using machine vision cameras at the gate and on spotters to create a digital twin of the yard.

Ally Logistic Property (Thailand), or ALP, has launched OMEGA 1 Bangna, a new smart warehouse project on a total area of more than 260,000 square metres in the Bangna-EEC economic corridor, accommodating more than 160,000 pallet positions. Chali Chang, Co-Founder and CEO of ALP, said the project develops the We Invest, You Operate concept through an Infrastructure-as-a-Service business model, under which ALP invests in and manages the building, automation hardware, software and maintenance, while tenants pay for services based on actual usage. This allows operators to access automation without bearing upfront investment, or Zero CAPEX, for racking systems, robotic cranes and automation infrastructure. The project installs a 40-metre-high automated storage and retrieval system, or AS/RS, along with high-speed cranes, which the company says work three times faster than forklifts and manual labour and raise operational efficiency by up to 35% compared with conventional warehouses. It also uses the ALPOS operating system to connect warehouse management, robots and automation on a single data platform, and is designed to LEED Gold standards. ALP is backed by partners and financial institutions in Thailand and abroad, including CapitaLand Investment Limited, Pruksa Holding, Cathay Life Insurance and Malaysia's Employees Provident Fund. In 2022, ALP co-invested in the CapitaLand SEA Logistics Fund, which has total equity of 400 million Singapore dollars. Over the past 10 years, ALP and its partners have invested a cumulative total of more than 2 billion US dollars. In the first half of 2026, the company managed more than 20 warehouses across Asia, with a combined area of more than 1.3 million square metres. It aims over the long term to develop 48 smart warehouses in eight countries, lifting managed area to 8 million square metres with total investment of more than 8 billion US dollars. OMEGA 1 Bangna is now open for operators to inquire and apply to lease space, and ALP plans to expand the model to other strategic locations in Thailand and Southeast Asia.

After market close on September 15, Hangcha Group announced plans to issue convertible corporate bonds to unspecified investors, raising no more than 2.259 billion yuan with a term of six years. After deducting issuance expenses, the proceeds will be directed to a forklift robot smart factory project, a new energy forklift expansion project, a forklift robot and logistics robot research and development project, and replenishing working capital, with planned allocations of 759 million yuan, 705 million yuan, 225 million yuan, and 570 million yuan respectively. The total investment in the forklift robot smart factory project is 872 million yuan. The matter has been approved by the company's board of directors and still requires submission to the shareholders' meeting for review. This marks another major commitment by Hangcha Group to intelligent development following its 2025 acquisition of Zhejiang Guozi Robotics Technology Company. In the first half of 2026, the company's revenue from intelligent logistics integration and robotics-related business reached 796 million yuan, up 30.81 percent year on year, while cumulative new orders for Hangcha Guozi Intelligent reached 892 million yuan, up 29.26 percent year on year.

Goldman Sachs raised its 2035 forecast for humanoid robot shipments to approximately 6.5 million units, up from about 1.4 million previously, a nearly fivefold increase, in its recently published 80-page Physical AI report. The bank also lifted its 2030 forecast from 256,000 to 890,000 units and its 2026 estimate from 51,000 to 75,000, and now values the 2035 humanoid market at roughly $138 billion versus its previous $38 billion estimate. Goldman estimates each humanoid could carry $3,000 to more than $6,000 of semiconductor content, which at 6.5 million units would translate into roughly $19.5 billion to $39 billion of annual chip demand. The bank expects logistics and warehousing to lead adoption, with automotive manufacturing following, and estimates Amazon's broader automation efforts could produce about $72 billion in cumulative service-cost savings from 2026 through 2030, potentially adding as much as 240 basis points to operating margins in an upside scenario. Goldman still flags reliability, limited real-world training data, autonomy and cost as obstacles, while Morgan Stanley has predicted 1 billion humanoid robots by 2050 and RBC Capital Markets calls it a $9 trillion market by then.

SEER Robotics reported 67.5% year-on-year revenue growth to RMB264.4 million in H1 2026, alongside a 197.5% increase in overseas revenue and more than 550% growth in new overseas orders. The results mark the company's first interim earnings announcement since its HKEX listing on June 24, 2026, highlighting accelerating international expansion and continued commercialization of embodied intelligence technologies. Gross profit increased 71.7% year-on-year, while overall gross margin reached 46.6%. Shipments exceeded 8,000 units, up more than 80% year-on-year, and new orders surpassed RMB467 million, representing growth of more than 60% year-on-year. International markets recorded particularly strong growth during the period. Overseas revenue reached approximately RMB65.8 million, up 197.5% year-on-year and accounting for 25% of total revenue, compared with 14% in the same period last year. New overseas orders reached approximately RMB124 million, an increase of more than 550% year-on-year. As of June 30, 2026, SEER Robotics had customers across 43 overseas countries and regions, supported by expanded local sales and service capabilities and international channel partnerships. The expanding international footprint coincided with a growing base of real-world robotic deployments. As of June 30, 2026, intelligent robots equipped with SEER Robotics' "Robot Brain" technology had been deployed for 2,500+ customers across 20+ industries, spanning diverse robotic platforms and application scenarios. This deployment base also supports the commercialization of embodied intelligence technologies. Products powered by E2E and VLA models have achieved scaled commercial deployment among leading customers in the global semiconductor, automotive and 3C electronics sectors, extending embodied intelligence technologies from development and demonstration toward industrial applications. The underlying development cycle is supported by a closed-loop of embodied intelligence infrastructure, combining unified cloud infrastructure with a cloud-edge architecture. The infrastructure spans the full workflow, from robot integration and data collection through cleaning and labeling, model training, simulation and evaluation, to deployment back to robots, enabling continuous iteration of data and models across physical robot deployments. By linking robot operations, real-world data and model development within an integrated workflow, the architecture supports the continued deployment and optimization of embodied intelligence applications across different robotic platforms and industrial scenarios.

EAIGLE, an automation company focused on gate-to-dock logistics, has closed a growth funding round on the heels of 350% year-over-year revenue growth, CEO and founder Amir Hoss said in an interview with FreightWaves. The company's computer vision platform reduces gate dwell times that previously ranged from 7.5 to 18 minutes down to under 30 seconds—and sometimes under one minute—by tapping into camera infrastructure that facilities already own. At one active facility processing roughly 1,100 trucks per day across two gates and four lanes, EAIGLE replaced 18 full-time staff across three shifts with a fully unmanned, paperless operation. The platform also functions as a theft-deterrent layer, stopping an average of two to three cargo theft attempts per month at high-theft distribution centers by flagging mismatched or expired bills of lading and carriers with prior theft history. Looking ahead, Hoss said the company has a product announcement coming within two weeks and is fielding requests for faster expansion across North America and internationally, with some customers set to begin testing autonomous truck acceptance into fully automated yards within months.

Geek+, a global leader in intelligent robotics, announced its interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2026, with new signed orders jumping 35.5% year-on-year to RMB2.385 billion and revenue climbing 25.3% to RMB1.284 billion. The company's subscription-based services emerged as a new growth engine, with orders reaching RMB156 million, up over 75% year-on-year, and subscription orders in the Americas soaring 455%. Gross margin improved to 35.8%, while adjusted net loss narrowed 32.1% to RMB60.6 million; excluding embodied intelligence R&D investment of RMB44.5 million, the loss shrank 81.9% to RMB16.1 million. Geek+ also reported strong growth in Pallet-to-Person orders (over 200% year-on-year) and manufacturing scenario orders (over 600% year-on-year), and it retained the No. 1 global AMR market share for seven consecutive years, according to Interact Analysis. Looking ahead, the company targets cumulative shipments of over 10,000 units of embodied intelligence products within three years.

The government has revealed that in the first half of 2026, actual investment exceeded 535.8 billion baht, an increase of 27% from the same period last year. Notably, in the second quarter, investment exceeded 250 billion baht. This investment has created over 630,000 jobs for Thai people, with more than 60% in advanced electronics, automotive, digital, automation, and robotics industries. Of this, investment in AI-related and advanced electronics businesses exceeded 127 billion baht, covering optical signal transmission equipment, electronic circuit boards, high-capacity hard disk drives, AI servers, and digital infrastructure. Deputy government spokesperson Ms. Lalida Periswattana said the goal is not just to increase investment value but to create jobs, income, and opportunities for Thai entrepreneurs to enter the supply chain. The Board of Investment (BOI) will promote Thai entrepreneurs into the supply chains of semiconductors, smart electronics, AI, and future vehicles, while incorporating industry proposals to improve investment promotion measures.

Amazon Web Services and NVIDIA have expanded their long-term partnership, with AWS set to deploy 2 million additional NVIDIA GPUs, including Blackwell Ultra, Rubin, and Rubin Ultra architectures, between 2027 and 2028. This builds on Amazon's earlier commitment to install 1 million NVIDIA chips starting in 2026, underscoring its continued reliance on NVIDIA hardware despite developing its own AI chips through Annapurna Labs. Financial terms were not disclosed, but the multi-year deal aims to scale agentic AI, scientific research, enterprise automation, and physical AI. As part of the integration, AWS will incorporate NVIDIA's Vera CPU infrastructure and collaborate with Annapurna Labs to extend NVLink Fusion with high-bandwidth memory for AWS Trainium chips. The companies also plan to build dedicated AI factories for the U.S. Government, featuring 100,000 GPUs on secure AWS infrastructure for national security workloads. Additionally, NVIDIA Nemotron open models will be available on Amazon Bedrock and Amazon SageMaker, and Amazon Robotics will implement NVIDIA's physical AI platform to advance warehouse automation.

As the shortage of agricultural workers becomes more severe, efforts to efficiently grow vegetables and fruits indoors using artificial intelligence and sensor technology are spreading. Oishii Farm, which operates a strawberry plant factory in the United States, has established a new research and development base in Hamura City, Tokyo, and plans to advance efficient cultivation of other crops such as tomatoes, as well as the development of robots that automatically handle planting and packaging. In June, NTT East and others began a demonstration experiment in Tokyo combining aquaponics with nishikigoi carp farming and Korean ginseng cultivation. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, the number of farmers whose main source of income is agriculture is projected to fall from about 2.05 million in 2010 to about 980,000 in 2026, and the government has set a target of 4.6 trillion yen in public and private investment in plant factories by fiscal 2040. There are currently around 440 plant factories in Japan, a 1.4-fold increase compared with ten years ago, but new entrants require large initial costs, and there have been cases of bankruptcy due to failure to recover investment.

Amazon is deepening its automation push with plans for a new robotics manufacturing facility in Austin, Texas, a move that reinforces the company's long-term effort to lower fulfillment costs and improve efficiency across its sprawling logistics network. The project will create between 300 and 500 manufacturing and engineering jobs and further expands Amazon's already sizable investment footprint in Texas. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced Wednesday that Amazon had selected Austin for the new facility. The company has invested more than $100 billion in Texas since 2010, making the state an increasingly important hub for Amazon's logistics, cloud and technology operations. Amazon has increasingly relied on robotics and automation to make its fulfillment network faster and less labor intensive, meaning expanded in-house robotics capacity could help support productivity gains as the company processes larger volumes of packages.

Flex Ltd. raised its fiscal 2027 revenue guidance to $33.7-$35.2 billion from $32.3-$33.8 billion, driven by momentum in its Regulated Manufacturing Solutions segment. In the first quarter of fiscal 2027, RMS revenues increased 12% year over year to $2.7 billion, with adjusted operating margin expanding 130 basis points to 6.6%. Management projects RMS revenues to grow in the mid-single-digits to high-single-digits in fiscal 2027, supported by energy infrastructure, robotics, and warehouse automation demand. The company also expects Cloud and Power Infrastructure revenues to grow 65-75%, though free cash flow conversion is projected at roughly 40% due to spin-off costs. Flex shares have gained 8.4% in the past month, and the Zacks Consensus Estimate for fiscal 2027 earnings has been revised upward over the past 60 days.

Walmart is piloting Symbotic's SymMicro automated fulfillment system inside one of its stores for the first time. The in-store SymMicro pilot is designed to handle e-commerce order fulfillment within Walmart's existing store network. The move is intended to change how Walmart processes online orders, with a focus on speed and efficiency for shoppers. This marks a new step in Walmart's use of automation technology across its retail operations.

The Board of Investment has disclosed actual investment figures for the first half of 2026 totaling 535.8 billion baht, an increase of 27 percent from the same period last year. In the second quarter, actual investment exceeded 255 billion baht, up 31 percent year on year. Industries related to artificial intelligence and digital infrastructure recorded actual investment of more than 127 billion baht in the second quarter, or about half of total actual investment, more than doubling from a year earlier. These promoted projects will employ more than 630,000 Thai workers, with over 60 percent in high-technology industries such as electronics, automotive, digital, automation and robotics. BOI Secretary General Narit Therdsteerasukdi said the BOI will intensify monitoring and accelerate actual investment after promotion through the Thailand FastPass mechanism, so that the benefits of investment promotion translate concretely into business activity, employment, exports and economic growth.

AutoStore Holdings reported record second-quarter revenue of $192 million, up 43% year over year and 16% sequentially, alongside record order intake of $218 million. The company also announced a global framework agreement with Amazon, though it includes no purchasing commitments, and launched a share buyback program of up to $75 million. Gross margin came in at 72%, adjusted EBITDA margin rose to 45% from 44% in the first quarter, and order backlog stood at $596 million at quarter-end. Full-year revenue guidance is around $700 million, implying roughly flat revenue in the second half versus the first half, while management expects margins to moderate slightly due to increased investments in product innovation, software, AI, and commercial capabilities.

Annual investment in private 5G networks for vertical industries is projected to surpass $6.6 billion by the end of 2029, growing at a compound annual growth rate of approximately 34% between 2026 and 2029, according to a new report from ResearchAndMarkets.com. The report tracks more than 9,300 private cellular network engagements across 130 countries as of the second quarter of 2026, including over 4,600 private 5G installations. Adoption is accelerating among major manufacturers, mining companies, energy providers, and technology businesses, with organizations such as Tesla, Ford, Hyundai, Toyota, LG Electronics, Foxconn, and Whirlpool eliminating connectivity-related stoppages after migrating automated guided vehicle and autonomous mobile robot communications from Wi-Fi to private 5G. Physical AI is emerging as a major market driver, with industrial organizations connecting automated vehicles, mobile robots, drones, and semi-humanoid systems for applications including autonomous material transport, remote-controlled mining, and predictive maintenance inspections. The report provides global and regional market forecasts through 2030, covering two network types, three infrastructure submarkets, four spectrum licensing models, 13 frequency-band categories, 16 vertical industries, and five regional markets.

FedEx has started using Dexterity's dual-armed Mech trailer loading systems at its Hagerstown Hub in Maryland, automating part of its trailer loading work. The most followed FedEx narrative puts fair value at about $351.49 versus the last close of $325.08, framing the current price as a 7.5% discount. FedEx's DRIVE initiative is targeting $2.2 billion in cost savings for fiscal 2025 and a total of $4 billion compared to the fiscal 2023 baseline, expected to enhance net margins through structural cost reductions. The company still faces execution risk around the Freight separation and softer higher-margin freight volumes that could pressure earnings.

The Motley Fool highlights three robotics and automation stocks for investors to consider in August, citing strong growth projections for the industrial robotics market. Rockwell Automation, with a dominant 50% market share in programmable logic controllers in North America, reported second-quarter sales of $2.2 billion and GAAP earnings per share of $3.10. Ouster, a developer of digital 3D LiDAR sensors, saw first-quarter revenue surge 49% to $48.6 million and gross margins of 43%, though it posted a net loss of $17.4 million. Symbotic, an AI-powered supply chain automation company backed by Walmart, reported first-half revenue of $1.3 billion and flipped to a net profit of $22.8 million.

Amazon's artificial intelligence and custom chip businesses have each reached a $25 billion annual revenue run rate, combining for more than $50 billion and triple-digit year-over-year growth. The company's online advertising revenue accelerated to $19.8 billion in the second quarter, a 26% year-over-year increase that helped drive operating income to $27.5 billion, up 43% from a year earlier. Amazon also launched a next-generation Proteus warehouse robot capable of moving loads up to 1,300 pounds and operating throughout fulfillment centers, contributing to record delivery speeds for Prime members with 40% more items delivered same-day or overnight.

Amazon delivered more than 40% of items same day or overnight globally in the first half of the year, and plans to more than double its fleet of robotic arms like Cardinal and Sparrow in 2026. The company expanded its ultra-fast Amazon Now service, which promises delivery in 30 minutes or less, to 80 U.S. cities and towns and several major cities in Egypt, now available in nine countries and over 250 cities and towns. CEO Andy Jassey said Amazon Now saw more than 80% growth in gross sales and units sold quarter-over-quarter, with more than 60% more customers served. CFO Brian Olsavsky noted progress in optimizing inventory and shortening shipping distances, while the company surpassed 1 million robots deployed across its operations network. Amazon reported a 20% gain in net sales to $200.6 billion and a 43% rise in operating income to $27.5 billion in the second quarter.

Nightfood Holdings, operating under its TechForce Robotics brand, is developing a proprietary Robotic Connective Network and patent-pending decentralized coordination technology designed to let robots from different manufacturers coordinate tasks autonomously. The company aims to move beyond individual machine autonomy by enabling direct device-to-device communication that reduces reliance on continuous human intervention, allowing fleets to negotiate task ownership based on real-time factors such as proximity, workload, and battery status. This approach targets the growing operational friction in facilities deploying mixed fleets, where robots often operate in isolated, manufacturer-specific ecosystems. Nightfood’s architecture is built to support compatible third-party systems, positioning the coordination layer as a scalable asset that could grow more valuable as more devices connect. The company’s model combines recurring Robot-as-a-Service revenue with commercial deployments and a deepening intellectual property portfolio.