Walmart acquires robotics firm

Retail giant Walmart has agreed to acquire robotics automation company Alert Innovation

Walmart has been working with Alert to customise technology for its market fulfilment centres (MFC) since 2016 and this new investment will enable Walmart to leverage its store footprint for storage and fulfilment.

For customers, this means orders can be fulfilled quickly and conveniently through pickup and delivery, giving them the items they want, when and where they want them.

In late 2019, Walmart began piloting its first MFC in Salem, New Hampshire, using bot technology from Alert specifically built for Walmart. The bot technology is notable within the industry, due to its fully autonomous bots that store, retrieve and dispense orders by moving horizontally, laterally and vertically across three temperature zones without any lifts or conveyors.

This provides fewer space constraints inside the MFC and eliminates the need to pause the entire system for bot maintenance.