Grasping Robots Compete to Rule Amazon’s Warehouses
I find it interesting that they try so hard to eliminate warehouse workers, all the while making structural and capital decisions that ultimately increase inventory, shipping, planning, procurement, split shipment, and reverse logistics costs...all of which add up to way more of a cost problem than the handful of cents per unit of warehouse processing costs. Amazon&#x27;s cost problems have almost nothing to do with warehouse workers and everything to do with management and their inability to comprehend the consequences of their rash decisions. And because their capital plan is consumed by these bad decisions, they are quite literally locking them into place.<p>I&#x27;m increasingly convinced that amazon has opened themselves up to competition on simultaneous price and performance fronts, even with relatively few robots and a unionized and well paid work force. A few key structural decisions made up front by intelligent and informed people will make all the difference.