Enlarge / Stretch is ready for warehouse work. (credit: Boston Dynamics)
Birkenstock boston Dynamics has launched its second commercial robot. After launching its four-legged robot dog, Spot , on the market in 2020 for $75, 000, it’s now showing off the particular commercial version of Stretch, a warehouse box-moving robot that is now available for purchase.
Stretch was introduced in prototype form in March 2021, and after a year of on-the-job trials and more development, it has been refined into a real commercial product. The purpose of the bot is still the same: it’s a box mover. Extend is a warehouse worker that is meant to quickly take over unloading trucks, depalletizing boxes, plus building orders without any need to build additional infrastructure.
Box-moving arms are nothing new, but usually they are stationary, which means you have to bolt them to the floor in the specific spot and design your warehouse around the robot location. Stretch is mounted on a new big, wheeled base, so it offers more human-like flexibility in what it can do throughout the day. You can have Stretch drive right into a truck in addition to do some box unloading in the morning and then move on to the order building later in the afternoon. The base is the same size as a pallet, so it can go just about anywhere in a warehouse.
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