Ocado’s Porter AMR can automate pallet and cage dealing with and full-case achievement duties, together with selecting, cross-dock, putaway and stock strikes. | Supply: Ocado
Ocado Clever Automation (OIA), a part of Ocado Group, launched Porter AMR at ProMat 2025 this week.
Porter is a pallet-moving autonomous cellular robotic (AMR) that navigates warehouses to automate a number of warehouse workflows reminiscent of cross-docking, bulk-item selecting, putaway, and pallet motion.
“Porter from OIA automates low-value, guide duties and fosters a extra productive office by supporting associates, growing case selecting charges, and automating the motion of excessive volumes of stock,” mentioned Jeff Larson, Director of Options Design for Ocado Cell Robotic System at OIA. “Corporations in third-party logistics, retail, e-commerce, distribution, and healthcare can maximize warehouse productiveness and scale operations up or down simply with out relying on guide forklifts and costly licensed forklift drivers.”
The corporate’s patented system-directed software program intelligently orchestrates every Porter autonomous pallet-moving robotic, or a complete fleet of them, to cut back journey occasions and keep away from warehouse congestion. In the meantime, Ocado’s Achievement Execution System (FES) teams orders to maximise case selecting, optimize route plans, and cut back steps between picks. In the meantime, machine studying prioritizes and plans pallet stacking intelligently to keep away from product harm.
Ocado received its begin creating automated storage and retrieval techniques (ASRS) for the grocery trade. In recent times, nonetheless, the firm has been making an attempt to carry extra robots into the fold and develop its operations to new industries.
In July 2023, Ocado acquired AMR maker 6 River Techniques from Shopify, including AMRs to its portfolio for the primary time. The corporate paid simply $12.7 million to amass 6 River Techniques. For comparability, Shopify paid $450 million to amass 6 River Techniques in September 2019. In 2020, Ocado acquired two U.S.-based robotics firms for $287 million.
Porter’s key options
Porter picks, strikes, and locations pallets straight from the ground with precision, even when they’re aligned back-to-back. It acknowledges its environment to soundly deal with and transport heavy masses autonomously and might be configured to deal with cages, growing flexibility and increasing achievement capabilities.
Porter AMR options embody:
- An onboard touchscreen with a reside front-camera view, enabling associates to soundly maneuver Porter in guide mode.
- A 3,300-pound (1,500 kilograms) payload capability to move densely packed pallets.
- The power to move one pallet or two roll cages on a single journey.
- Dynamic task-switching software program that seamlessly transitions Porter between stock motion and case-picking duties as operational wants evolve.
- Superior built-in sensors to detect, acknowledge and deal with any open or closed normal pallet varieties, together with Commonwealth Dealing with Tools Pool (CHEP), Grocery Producers Affiliation (GMA) and European Pallet Affiliation e.V.(EPAL) pallets.
- A slim, counterbalance-free design with a good turning radius to function in pallet lanes as slim as 51 inches (1.3 meters) huge.
The corporate is displaying Porter at ProMat this week in Sales space S2712.
Register now so you do not miss out!
Porter integrates with warehouse operations
Porter can combine with present wall-to-wall achievement platforms, Warehouse Execution Techniques (WES), Warehouse Management Techniques (WCS), and Warehouse Administration Techniques (WMS), to prioritize duties with minimal disruption and enhance warehouse productiveness. These techniques can collaborate to select and go complicated orders throughout a number of robots, automate inbound and outbound pallet motion from an ASRS from Ocado or different Unique Tools Producers (OEMs), and hook up with robotic arms to ship or decide pallets from palletizing and depalletizing areas.
Moreover, Porter’s superior imaginative and prescient system allows it to navigate safely and autonomously with out requiring infrastructure modifications or guide intervention. Transferring at speeds of as much as 4.5 miles per hour, the AMR dynamically adjusts its pace when detecting folks or tools within the space, making certain office security.
Porter intelligently parallel parks itself in aisles to cut back congestion, holding operations seamless for each robots and human associates. Porter AMR is a part of the Ocado Cell Robotic System (OMRS), a sophisticated achievement system for clever workflow orchestration.