Amazon Employs Robot Army to Help Fulfill Holiday Sales

[[Coi] Mr.CLuBBeR]

Let's hope they don't turn against us

Cyber Monday is the biggest online shopping day of the year, and it follows on the heels of Black Friday, an increasingly busy day for e-commerce. If you're Amazon, trying to keep up with all the orders can be a daunting task, which is why it's getting help from robots. Amazon on Monday unveiled its eight generation fulfillment center, which uses robotics supplied by Kiva Technology to keep everything running smoothly.
"The Amazon fulfillment teams are dedicated to innovating in our fulfillment centers to increase speed of delivery while enabling greater local selection at lower costs for our customers. The advancements in our latest fulfillment centers hit all three of these customer desires while continuing to provide a work environment that is great for employees," said Dave Clark, Amazon’s senior vice president of worldwide operations and customer service.
Of course, Amazon still fills its ranks with flesh and blood workers, of which it plans to hire 80,000 on a temporary basis to help with seasonal orders. That's a 14 percent bump over the number of humans it brought on board for the holiday shopping season a year ago.
As for the robots, Amazon spent $775 million acquiring units from Kiva Systems in 2012 and began using them in July of this year, according to Time. They're 16 inches tall, weigh 320 pounds, and zoom around the facility doing what's needed. Nevertheless, Amazon says it's not looking to eliminate jobs with its robot workers, as evidenced by an increase in hiring this year, and is simply trying to keep up with demand.
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