ABB Unveils AI-Powered Modules to Streamline Warehousing

ABB introduces two cost and time-saving modules for automating the picking, induction, and sorting of high-volume, high-mix products in warehousing and logistics environments. The modules come pre-integrated to support rapid setup and reduce commissioning time to one week. The AI-powered sorting and picking technology is backed by ABB’s vision technology and works in conjunction with the company’s Application Controller Platform (ACP). Using the two latest modules and ACP mitigates research and development risks for systems integrators.

The Robotic Parcel Inductor module uses AI to automate sorter feeding, providing a full-circle automation solution for parcel singulation within the warehousing and logistics industries. Image used courtesy of ABB

Meeting eCommerce Head on

For many countries across the globe, the eCommerce explosion coincided with the coronavirus pandemic. People were seeking their pre-COVID shopping thrills on the internet and realized that they could access and buy whatever they needed online without wasting time and energy visiting the shops. More importantly, online shopping also reduced/reduces infection risk and spread.

According to McKinsey and Company’s insight report, big marketplace names such as Amazon, JD.com, Bol.com, and Zalando.com managed over 80% of logistics associated with e-commerce sales. Their involvement extended to last-mile delivery and inventory handling (for logistics providers’ inventories). Marketplaces improved their capabilities, focusing on enhanced data sets for parcel flows (to be used for settling desired delivery rates with parcel couriers for individual marketplace sellers).

The primary challenges facing warehousing and logistics facilities are growing parcel volume, high product mix (in the context of sorting, picking, and packaging), timely and efficient order fulfillment, and retention of a skilled workforce. To tackle these challenges, warehousing and logistics companies will need to onboard innovative robotics and automation technologies to economize on limited storage space, maximize picking, sorting, and packing using machine vision and AI, manage inventories, and seamlessly corroborate human employees with a high-functioning robotic fleet to optimize the order fulfillment process.

Robotic Fashion and Parcel Inductor

According to ABB, both Robotic Fashion Inductor and Robotic Parcel Inductor modules provide a market-competitive picking accuracy of greater than 99.5%. The modules leverage ABB’s AI-based vision technology to sort through, pick, and induct amidst high-mix packages with items varying in size and shape. Customers can train the AI model to reject spherical or cylindrical items (those that are non-inducible) to avoid delayed throughput and enhance the order fulfillment process. The modules are designed to alleviate unnecessary and mundane labor, reduce labor costs, enhance worker robotic skills training, improve process speeds and accuracy, and bolster operational efficiencies as a whole.

ABB’s ACP provides a central platform for application configuration and control for operators, developers, and integrators. Image used courtesy of ABB

The new modules are designed to enable rapid singulation-sorting of parcels in bulk and arrange them single file and well-spaced for downstream processing. The Robotic Parcel Inductor manages small packages at 1,500 picks per hour, and the Robotic Fashion Inductor handles 1,300 picks per hour of polybagged textiles. AI-powered path planning and vision provide more precise, collision-free handling.

These components are pre-integrated for rapid implementation, reducing commissioning time to just a week. Operators can access robots, grippers, and vision systems through ABB's ACP, a unified interface designed to facilitate improved motion control, identification, and grasping. AI models that have already been trained reduce the complexity of setup, research, and development work required for automated picking systems.