LOWELL, Mass. – NextShift Robotics recently announced that its autonomous robot workflow would be used in the newly expanded Innovation Lab of Kenco Logistics, one of the leading third-party logistics providers in North America.

The piece-picking workflow system, based on advanced autonomous mobile robot technology, will be featured in Kenco’s expanded 10,000 square-foot physical warehouse space. Launched in 2015, the company’s Innovation Lab provides a gest facility for Kenco specialists to assess new value-added technologies within a dedicated real-world warehouse environment. By exercising technologies of many types in the warehouse, Kenco said it can provide accurate visibility into the solutions, reducing implementation times for its customers.

“In the logistics industry, experience is the new differentiator. Our expanded Kenco Innovation Lab lets us accelerate our industry experience and insight,” said Kristi Montgomery, vice president of innovation at Kenco. “The NextShift robotic solution is an example of an innovative advanced technology that can create major value for customers when coupled with Kenco’s industry expertise.”

Efficiency through collaboration

The workflow has autonomous mobile robots placing empty totes in the pick area, with workers picking order lines to the totes, and then robots moving the totes between the pick locations and then off to packing stations. NextShift, one of the 2019 “Companies We’re Watching” named by Robotics Business Review, said the goal is to achieve optimal efficiency through collaboration between independent workers, orders, and robots.

“We look forward to supporting Kenco as they help their customers evaluate new technologies,” said Mary Ellen Sparrow, CEO of NextShift Robotics. “Kenco provides more than a showcase for our technology, it is a powerful opportunity to prove the real-world benefits of the NextShift solution to supply chain leaders that are hungry for innovation.”

Kenco said the scale of its Innovation Lab provides the opportunity for many technologies to be tested simultaneously by technology experts and supply chain engineers, “to deliver full value insight on a breadth of technologies and how well they integrate with other warehouse environments to produce business benefits.”