I have been doing video interviews with a number of C-level execs and practitioners about acrobatics they have been seeing in various vertical sectors during the COVID-19 crisis and the "New normal" they can expect as the economy wakes up. Here is the index to the growing list of interviews.
This executives profiled in this series (and those in Analyst Cam and Burning Platform series) have talked about all kinds of human heroics - in healthcare, vaccine development, diversity moves; in IT, in HR, supply chains and more during the crisis. They have talked about massive scaling up/down, rapid innovations, pivots etc. In the huge ecommerce volumes of the last few months, the unsung heroes are, in addition to humans, warehouse robots.
Guy Courtin of 6 River Systems had demoed here their Chuck collaborative robots and how they can be deployed in smaller locations, closer to customers, without needing to invest much in traditional conveyors or large warehouse infrastructure. While Amazon and its Kiva robots get much of the attention, 6 River (now part of Shopify) and Chuck robots also deserve plenty of kudos.
So, I was really pleased to have Jerome Dubois and Rylan Hamilton, co-founders and co-CEOs of 6 River join this series - they were pioneers with Kiva, and now with the smaller, more agile Chuck robots. We talk about changes coming as more companies move to "micro-fulfillment" (as compared to very large Amazon fulfillment centers - see my tour report here) to accommodate new models like flash sales, order on-line, pick-up in stores, regionalized inventories, last-mile delivery expectations and constraints while keeping warehouse workers safely distanced, quickly trained and incredibly productive. We have a wide ranging conversation around how supply chains and the cold chain have stepped up during the pandemic and why we will need more automation to keep supply chains sustainable. We also have a philosophical segment about accelerated automation in every sector and the likely impact on society. As I described in Silicon Collar, automation has historically taken over "dull, dirty and dangerous" tasks and they describe how Chuck helps both employers and workers.
It is a fascinating conversation. Watch it and the demo of the Chuck bots. Acrobatics for sure. It's a nice way to wrap up this series on business heroics we have seen so much of this year!
