Telexistence Inc. and FamilyMart Co. are rolling out a fleet of AI-driven robots to restock shelves in 300 convenience stores across Japan.The robot arms are designed to replenish drinks in refrigerators and are now in mass production, Tokyo-based Telexistence said in a statement Wednesday.

Figure 1: Robots to restock shelves in 300 convenience stores across Japan.

Figure 1 shows that they’ll be installed in FamilyMart locations across major metropolitan areas later this month and help relieve store workers while also filling the void left by a shrinking workforce in the country.

Dubbed TX SCARA -- standing for Selective Compliance Assembly Robot Arm -- the machines are largely autonomous, with remote piloting as a fallback option should the artificial intelligence fail or encounter out-of-place items. Each unit can replace one to three hours of human work per day per store, Telexistence said. [1]

“The decline in Japan’s labour population is one of the key management issues for FamilyMart to continue stable store operations,” FamilyMart general manager Tomohiro Kano said. “The newly created time can be reallocated to customer service and shop floor enhancement.”

FamilyMart is to pay Telexistence a monthly fee for the robot’s labour, its maintenance and the support of remote workers who can pilot the arm using a virtual reality headset when needed.The bots can work without human assistance 98% of the time, Telexistence said.[2]

Telexistence worked together on the design and technology of the bots with Microsoft and Nvidia, two of the biggest names in US technology.

In order to optimize restocking duties, the SCARA arms process information using Nvidia's Jetson AI platform. To store and access sales data, the robots will be employing Microsoft's Azure cloud infrastructure.

FamilyMart is now operating 16,000 convenience stores (which is called combine in Japan) across its home market, but Telexistence and Microsoft said that they also intend to make the technology available over the entire world. [3]

References:

1. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/robot-arms-replacing-shelf-stockers-000000755.html
2. https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2022/08/11/2003783320
3. https://www.techtimes.com/articles/278997/20220810/japanese-stores-deploy-fleet-ai-driven-robots-replace-shelf-stockers.htm

Cite this article:

Sri Vasagi K (2022), AI-Driven Robots to Restock Shelves in Stores Across Japan, Anatechmaz, pp. 31