Locus Robotics Corp. last week reported that DHL Supply Chain has completed 1 billion picks assisted by its autonomous mobile robots, or AMRs. The partners said this milestone demonstrates “sustained warehouse performance.”
“For today’s consumers responding to viral trends or otherwise, reliability has become the baseline expectation,” wrote Mary Hart, senior content marketing manager at Locus, in a blog post.
“Orders are placed in seconds, delivery windows are tracked in real time, and delays are remembered long after the box is opened,” she added. “What shoppers rarely consider is the warehouse orchestration required behind the scenes to meet those expectations again and again.”
Bonn, Germany-based DHL Supply Chain is a subsidiary of Deutsche Post DHL Group. The company has also worked with AutoStore, Boston Dynamics, and numerous other automation providers. Its North American headquarters is in Westerville, Ohio.
DHL Supply Chain measures results
Since it first partnered with Locus Robotics in 2017, DHL Supply Chain has expanded its fleet to thousands of AMRs across more than 40 sites worldwide.
The robots support daily fulfillment activity, which DHL said has led to 30% to 180% increases in units picked per hour and an 80% reduction in training time. The company focuses on measurable improvements for all of its robotics partnerships.
“We’re spending time on the software and data readiness, and if we can’t measure the analytics, we won’t deploy the robots,” Brian Gaunt, vice president of digitalization at DHL Supply Chain, told Automated Warehouse at Manifest this month. “For example, with Locus, we can optimize and get more juice out of the squeeze.”
Locus’ 100 millionth pick in 2022 was also at a DHL facility, and the logistics provider announced plans to deploy 5,000 more AMRs in 2023. It surpassed 500 million picks in 2024.
Locus Robotics rolls along
“One billion picks is more than a milestone,” said Hart. “It reflects what becomes possible when fulfillment operations are engineered for consistency at scale.”
The billionth pick was a pink beanie, according to Wilmington, Mass.-based Locus Robotics. The company offers the Locus Origin collaborative AMRs, the Locus Vector heavy-duty robots, and its LocusONE orchestration platform for person-to-goods (P2G) picking.
At ProMat last year, it unveiled the Locus Array mobile manipulator, which it is deploying at a DHL site in Columbus, Ohio.
Locus received with a 2025 RBR50 Robotics Innovation Award for surpassing 4 billion robot-assisted picks in 2024. It had passed 6 billion worldwide in October 2025.
Last month, Radial Inc., a third-party logistics provider (3PL), reported more than 25 million units picked with AMRs at its e-commerce warehouse in Shepherdsville, Ky. Last week, Locus shared the results of a customer survey that found that consumer expectations continue to accelerate, leading to a “confidence gap” for automation.