Industry Findings: Within the United States, enterprise buyers are moving quickly toward intelligent mobile and manipulation solutions that reduce repetitive labour in high-throughput environments. The shift accelerated after several large-scale warehouse automation pilots demonstrated double-digit improvements in pick consistency and ergonomic risk reduction. This evidence-led adoption curve is reshaping procurement criteria: organisations increasingly favour platforms that combine perception, dynamic path planning, and fleet-wide optimisation rather than standalone hardware, pushing suppliers to mature their software stacks and after-sales engineering capabilities.
Industry Progression: Procurement behaviour in the U.S. is shifting toward perception-rich manipulators after operator pilots proved commercially meaningful: Amazon’s Vulcan (2025) — an AI-driven picking robot with tactile sensing now operating in Spokane — demonstrates that advanced manipulation at scale is feasible, which pushes enterprise buyers to favour suppliers who combine sophisticated sensing, continuous learning and robust maintenance programs to capture labour-reduction and throughput gains.
Industry Players: The US landscape is shaped by key players such as Amazon Robotics, Figure AI, Kodiak Robotics, Knightscope, Dusty Robotics, Starship Technologies, and Skydio etc. The U.S. environment is moving decisively toward dexterous automation and operational autonomy as core procurement criteria; notably, Figure AI’s announced manufacturing pilot with an OEM in March 2024 signalled serious commercial ambition for humanoid-capable manipulation in factory-adjacent service roles, which shifts buyer preference to suppliers that can combine mobility, perception and manipulation with enterprise-grade maintenance and continuous learning pipelines.