Amazon's $15B robot warehouse push

Good morning, robotics enthusiasts. Amazon is reportedly looking to invest a whopping $15B to expand its U.S. warehouse network and grow its massive fleet of next-gen industrial robots.

The company’s warehouses are seeing a seismic shift, with hundreds of thousands of tireless robots working alongside humans—but are robots truly close to replacing human workers entirely?

In today’s robotics rundown:

• Amazon’s $15B robot-driven warehouse push

• Samsung and Google’s new home bot

• Sanctuary seeks $175M in Apptronik sale

• Robots probing melting Antarctic icebergs

• Quick hits on other robotics news

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

AMAZON

📦 Amazon’s $15B robot-driven warehouse push

The Rundown: Amazon is reportedly seeking partners for a massive $15B expansion of its U.S. warehouse network—with the goal to build some 80 highly automated logistic facilities packed with next-gen industrial robots.

The details:

• Bloomberg reports that the plan includes multi-story fulfillment centers with advanced robotics to automate sorting, packing, and inventory management. 

• Key investments are planned for hyper-local delivery hubs, with robotics cutting last-mile times and achieving 65% faster Prime deliveries last year.

• The expansion will leverage Amazon’s latest robotics systems—Sequoia, Proteus, and Cardinal—while introducing next-gen automation.

• For example, Proteus moves without floor markers, navigating alongside workers, while Digit (by Agility Robotics) is being tested for tote handling.

Why it matters: Amazon has rapidly expanded its robotics operations over the years, with the rebranded Amazon Robotics rolling out more than 750K robots and autonomous systems. New facilities, like the prototype in Louisiana, will host 10 times more robots than older warehouses, with the number only rising in the coming years.

SAMSUNG

🤖 Samsung and Google’s new home bot

The Rundown: Samsung’s soccer ball-like home robot “Ballie”—first teased at CES 2020—is finally set to roll into homes this summer, thanks to a major partnership with Google to integrate the Gemini family of multimodal AI models.

The details:

• Under the partnership, Gemini will enable Ballie to process inputs such as voice

  commands, visual data from its camera, and environmental sensor readings. 

• The bot learns user habits over time to automate routines (e.g., morning music, ideal room temperature) and offers tailored advice on fashion, sleep, or health.

• It also functions as a hub for Samsung’s SmartThings ecosystem, allowing control of connected devices, with a built-in camera enabling pet monitoring.

• Equipped with LiDAR, 4K/2K cameras, and three-wheel navigation, Ballie also moves seamlessly through homes, avoiding obstacles and people.

Why it matters: Launching in mid-2025, Ballie marks Samsung’s big push into home robotics, leveraging its consumer electronics ecosystem against rivals like Apple and Google. With Gemini integration and a firm launch timeline, Samsung could easily take the lead in the category—price permitting.

SANCTUARY

🎯 Sanctuary seeks $175M in Apptronik sale

The Rundown: In a major shakeup among robotics startups, Vancouver-based humanoid maker Sanctuary is reportedly seeking to raise $175M by selling its majority stake in Texas-based robotics startup Apptronik.

The details:

• Sanctuary acquired a stake in Apptronik for $10M in 2022, but its value surged after Google and others invested $350M in the company earlier this year.

• Now, the sale of the stake could yield up to $125M, with venture capital firms contributing an additional $50M, aiming to close the round by May 2025.

• Sanctuary reportedly plans to acquire Rapid Robotics, a San Francisco rival valued at $193.7M in August 2021, to expand its U.S. talent pool.

• The company has been facing funding challenges, having raised $140M to date—far less than competitors like Tesla, which secured $700M in a single round.

Why it matters: Sanctuary’s scaling efforts have been slow—highlighted by last year’s CEO exit—but this sale is expected to bring fresh capital to support the development of its Phoenix humanoid. The company remains laser-focused on general-purpose robotics, even as rivals, including Apptronik, double down on manufacturing robots.

BRITISH ANTARCTIC SURVEY

🧊 Robots probing melting Antarctic icebergs

The Rundown: Robot gliders were sent underwater to study one of the world’s largest icebergs, A-68, before it melted and broke apart, with a new study published this week in Nature Geoscience detailing how melting icebergs impact ocean dynamics.

The details:

• The gliders—1.5m-long autonomous underwater vehicles with sensors—probed Antarctica’s A-68 after it broke off from the Larsen C ice shelf in 2017.

• Their sensors collected unprecedented data on salinity, temperature, and chlorophyll levels near the massive iceberg.

• Data showed that melting icebergs disrupt a layer of cold water called “Winter Water,” allowing nutrients to rise from deep waters and affecting the ecosystem.

• Piloted from 12K km away during the Covid lockdowns, one of the gliders was also trapped under the iceberg for days before resurfacing with data. 

Why it matters: This mission showcases the potential of robotics in polar research, with gliders operating in high-risk conditions near moving icebergs, collecting data that would have been impossible to gather otherwise. Scientists also say this data is crucial for understanding how icebergs affect ocean ecosystems and global climate systems.

QUICK HITS

📰 Everything else in robotics today

Figure CEO Brett Adcock is facing scrutiny for allegedly exaggerating the deployment of Figure humanoids at BMW’s plant, sparking concerns over transparency.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted that Tesla’s Optimus humanoids will “hopefully” join a Starship mission to explore the surface of Mars by the end of 2026.

A new report found that industrial robotics will surge to an incredible $291B by 2035, up from the current market value of $55B.

Clone Robotics just released a new clip of its Protoclone V1, a groundbreaking synthetic android with skin, muscles, tendons, and veins (that pump water).

Rodney Brooks, co-founder of iRobot (creator of the Roomba) and a leading robotics expert, criticized the hype around humanoids, calling them "overhyped theater." 

Shenzhen-based robotics company EngineAI has reportedly secured $28M in pre-A funding to further its advancements in humanoid robotics. 

Brinc, a Seattle-based emergency response drone startup founded by 25-year-old Blake Resnick, raised $75M, bringing its total funding to around $157M.

Zoox, Amazon's autonomous vehicle subsidiary, is testing its robotaxi service in Los Angeles, deploying a fleet of Toyota Highlanders equipped with its self-driving tech.

Penn State researchers just developed a soft magnetically controlled robot capable of navigating human blood vessels for targeted drug delivery.

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Rowan, Jennifer, and Joey—The Rundown’s editorial team