Boston Dynamics unveils Stretch: a new robot designed to move boxes in warehouses

Boston Dynamics is best known for its robot dog Spot, a machine designed to operate in a range of environments, from offshore oil rigs to deep underground mines. But in recent years, the company has increasingly focused on the logistics space and today unveils a new robot with a single application in mind: moving boxes in warehouses.

The robot is called Stretch and looks relatively drab for a Boston Dynamics creation. It is not modeled after humans or animals, but rather aims to be as practical as possible. It has a square movable base containing a set of wheels, a “perception mast” with cameras and other sensors, and a huge robotic arm with seven degrees of freedom and an array of suction cups at the end that can grip and move boxes up to 23 kilograms (50 lbs) in weight.

What connects Stretch to other Boston Dynamics machines is the emphasis on mobility. Usually, when automation equipment is installed in warehouses, the system is bolted in one place with a workflow modeled around it. Stretch, by comparison, is designed to fit into any existing workplace where it might be useful to load or unload goods.

“That’s what’s exciting about this system – it can provide automation to environments that don’t have an automation infrastructure,” said Michael Perry, vice president of business development for Boston Dynamics. The edge. “You can take that ability and you can move it to the back of the truck, you can move it around the aisles, you can move it alongside your conveyors. It all depends on the problem of the day. “

Image: Boston Dynamics

This will allow Boston Dynamics to target customers who would otherwise avoid automation because it is too expensive or too time consuming to integrate, Perry says. About 80% of the world’s warehouses have no automation equipment, giving the company a sizable addressable market. But Stretch isn’t priced yet, and for companies with low margins, a robot may not be worth the trouble, no matter how mobile.

Boston Dynamics has been interested in the logistics space since 2019 when it bought Kinema Systems, a company that makes machine vision software for robots in warehouses. He then designed a wheeled robot called Handle that could move boxes using a robotic arm, balancing itself with a huge counterweight swinging like a tail.

Perry says Handle had “the right footprint and reach” for warehouses, but couldn’t work fast enough. The robot’s arm is directly attached to its main body, which means the entire machine had to move with each load. Stretch’s arm, by comparison, swings freely thanks to clever (and patent-pending) counterweights hidden inside its square base.

“It’s really the secret sauce,” Perry says. “This base is able to handle the force of inertia of the arm plus the box swinging at a rapid weight, without having to rely on a steel plate weighing several thousand kilos bolted to the ground.

Image: Boston Dynamics

Stretch’s lineage dates back to Boston Dynamics’ two-legged Atlas robot, who is able to balance his weight so easily that he can run, jump, roll back and more. “Atlas picking up a box isn’t just about extending the arms and moving them, it’s about coordinating the hips, legs and torso,” says Perry. “Much of that same design thinking has been invested in Stretch.”

As a result, Boston Dynamics says Stretch can move up to 800 cases per hour, a production rate comparable to that of a human employee. Thanks to the high capacity batteries, Stretch can run for eight hours at a time before needing to be recharged.

This flow, however, should be treated with skepticism. Putting robots to work in warehouses is incredibly difficult due to the great variation in these spaces. Workflows can change on a daily basis as different products come and go, and what is often valued is flexibility. The inability of machines to meet these challenges so far is what has led to an all-or-nothing dynamic in automation. Either you redo the whole warehouse to be regular enough for the machines to understand, or you stick with the humans, masters of the unknown.

The big claim from Boston Dynamics is that Stretch will be able to bridge this gap. The company says the robot can be used by anyone with just a few hours of training and that its mobile base allows it to fit into spaces designed for humans. Will it work? We won’t know until Stretch gets the hang of the job. Boston Dynamics says it is currently looking for customers to test Stretch and aims for a commercial rollout in 2022.