“We're basically a software company,” Locus CEO Rick Falk says with a laugh. Although we look like a robot company, we are actually a software company. ”
This is a common term among companies whose most publicly available products are hardware. That's certainly the case with Locus, which makes the most famous non-Amazonian AMR (autonomous mobile robot). While it's true that these cargo-moving systems are the cornerstone of the Massachusetts-based company's warehouse operations, Faulk told TechCrunch that the company's software is what really separates market-leader Apartment from its competitors. he said.
Locus now offers essential fleet management software for coordinating robotic systems in busy environments. This is also a feature of his LocusHub Engine, the company's latest product. The platform, announced this week at the Modex Supply Chain Show in Atlanta, is designed to leverage the data collection that underlies the company's automated systems. Just like his Roomba at home, his AMR at Locus is packed with sensors that provide situational awareness and help it navigate around people, obstacles, and other robots.
At their heart, these are data collection machines and are also very good at moving heavy loads around warehouse floors. New software products use AI to process large amounts of collected data and predict what will happen next.
“Most of the reporting that's done in warehouses today is what we call 'reactive',” Faulk told TechCrunch. “That's what happened. Someone selected X units per hour. Here's how many units you should select per day, week, month. We thought that was great. We believe that, and we continue to need that, but we also believe that predictive analytics that tells us what's going to happen is very important.”
Predictive modeling powered by machine learning suggests where warehouse managers should place both human and robotic staff. This software can also be used to identify bottlenecks and adjust her AMR routes to increase efficiency.
“We uniquely integrated the data obtained from the robots into our platform,” says Falk. “For example, by accessing a mobile phone, any person in the system can see one robot. He can actually control that robot or update the robot with his mobile phone. We can do both. We have the ability to integrate.”
The creation of Locus was a direct result of Amazon's 2012 acquisition of Kiva Systems. A former Kiva customer, Quiet Logistics, was a customer at a loss when the retail giant decided to stop providing services to outside companies and instead focus its efforts on automating its own fulfillment processes. There was only one person. Quiet launched his own robotics division in 2014 and spun out Locus the following year.
The Kiva acquisition was a huge catalyst for the category as a whole. A former robotics startup executive has launched his 6 River Systems, a Locus competitor. However, the company has struggled in recent years following its acquisition by Shopify and subsequent sale to British grocery technology licensee Ocado Group. His other major competitor, Fetch Robotics, was founded in 2014. The company was acquired by commerce technology giant Zebra in 2021. Most recently, founder Melonee Wise left the company to join his growing Agility leadership team.
You can find dozens of direct competitors walking the halls of Modex this week, but Locus remains the market leader by a wide margin. This position has been further strengthened by the explosion of interest in warehouse automation accelerated by the pandemic. Investor activity is at an all-time high, giving a boost to companies hoping to level the playing field in a world completely dominated by 800-pound Amazon gorillas.
Investor excitement has since subsided. While it is true that many businesses are still having difficulty hiring staff, reversion to the mean continues. In January, Locus laid off a small number of employees, but the company has not yet disclosed how many.
“Frankly, like many of our clients, we overhired when we went to market,” Faulk says. “We came out of the pandemic with projections for stuff like staffing needs, but we probably overestimated.” The CEO said the “coordination” was not the engineering team, but Locus' go-to-market people. He added that it happened between.
But the company remains a success story in the broader category. We have achieved steady growth by focusing on the needs of our existing customers, rather than trying to be everything to everyone. Ten years after its founding, the tote transport AMR remains at the heart of everything his Locus does. Over the years, the company has added products such as his Vector, which can carry up to 600 pounds and has special wheels that effectively drift laterally and navigate tight spaces. Each new robot is essentially an iteration of Locus' core robotic product.
Now, human labor is essential to that story. Locus hasn't developed a mobile manipulator, so humans are required to load and unload the robot. When asked if Locus would be the company to bring the technology to warehouses, Falk said: We are considering various initiatives to reduce the workforce in our buildings. We have a research and development group that is looking at fully automating buildings. I'm sure time will tell.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Falk isn't particularly bullish about the role humanoid robots will play in the future.
“Perhaps for certain features, [be useful],” he explains. There are challenges right now between battery life, cost, uptime, and all the other things that come with that. Eventually there may be some use cases for specific things. But I think it's going to take years to get to scale. There's some testing that's going to happen, but I think it's going to take years to get to enterprise scale.”