FedEx is partnering with a California artificial intelligence (AI) company to test the use of smart robots for loading boxes into trailers.
In a September 26 announcement, Redwood City, California-based Dexterity AI announced a new collaboration with FedEx to use mobile, AI-equipped robots to take over manual truck loading duties.
Dexterity AI says that the “DexR” robots are able to “see, touch, think, and move quickly to pack trailers with stable, dense walls of randomized boxes.” The DexR is able to manually navigate towards the rear of a trailer and then connects to a conveyor belt that feeds the robot boxes from the sortation system.
“Our culture of innovation is driven by a desire to help our team members and customers succeed,” said Rebecca Yeung, corporate vice president of Operations Science and Advanced Technologies for FedEx. “Based on feedback from our operations team, we have been looking for a solution that helps alleviate the challenges of truck loading. Collaborating with Dexterity AI to combine the latest in AI and robotics supports our operations team while meeting growing customer demand.”
“FedEx shares our belief that innovation should solve the most difficult tasks in operations,” said Samir Menon, founder and CEO of Dexterity AI. “Our collaboration is driven by a vision of AI-powered robotics that is adaptable to our customer’s most pressing needs.”