US warehouse operators entering robot business

New York

IT was Amazon that drove America's warehouse operators into the robot business.

Quiet Logistics, which ships apparel out of its Devens, Massachusetts, warehouse, had been using robots made by a company called Kiva Systems. When Amazon bought Kiva in 2012, Quiet hired scientists.

In 2015 it spun out a new company called Locus Robotics, which raised US$8 million in venture capital. Last year, Locus unveiled its own warehouse robotics solution called the LocusBot - first using it for its own business, then selling them to companies that ship everything from housewares to car parts.

Now, Locus has landed a bigger fish: It's selling its robots to DHL Supply Chain (a unit of Deutsche Post DHL Group), the world's largest third-party logistics company. DHL will use the ma…