Next step will be to relay that information to another robot who can retrieve the item from backstock and refill the shelf. Doesn't seem too overly complicated to do that.

Walmart’s new robots are loved by staff, says the guy who sells robots.

Affection is mandatory for all company assets that can me anthropomorphized. That excludes of course all team members below rank of district manager.

Tesco Homeplus Virtual Subway Store in South Korea

I see drones delivering from this kind of display being realy cool if this was implemented in america properly.

I'd have to go to a Walmart to see, but I haven't been in years since they started cutting staff and leaving shelves unstocked.

Indeed, Why do they require robots to check if the empty shelves are indeed empty? (due to the staff being cut and cut, and cut again).

Round these parts we have Fred Meyer, which is kinda like Walmart except more focus on food (only the larger ones have clothes and furniture and such) and the added bonus of pretending you're better than the people who shop at Walmart.

Why can't the surveillance cameras detect when the shelves are emtpy or the labels are wrong? That seems like a cheaper solution.

Angle, resolution, that's not what they're wired for. This is a one size fits all solution that can be adapted for any store with flat floors and enough space in the aisles. And as Mythtyn points out, it's just a matter of time before these inventory bots have a big brother capable of restocking the shelves.

Why not have the same bot restock the shelves? Why do you need two bots?

While you’re at it, add the ability for the robot to make purchases and you don’t even need the customers. 100% efficiency achieved. :-P

I was thinking give the robot a taser and you won't need security.

If you arm robots (I assume to defend property?) be prepared for the eggshell rule. Someone is going to get killed eventually (a kid that the bot identifies incorrectly for example), and I can't see a jury in the world siding with the bot.

I could see a justice system siding with a corporation. I could see people siding with "Law and Order." As long as the victim isn't an affluent white kid and the media doesn't go into an anti-tech frenzy, I can't see people getting too worked up about it.

I humbly disagree. We as a nation are getting upset when human officers are wrongfully killing children when the officers can claim they were frightened. I'm not going to open that political can of worms, but what I feel makes the 'worms' is that you can side with the officer or the victim.

It becomes a much harder argument to state publicly that it was in the BEST interests of the store to tase, break the arm of, and/or kill a customer because they were potentially shoplifting, causing a disturbance, destroying property. Especially when the killer was never frightened. (Extra points if after killing the subject, the bot simply goes back to work)

The robots will probably not be (and better not be) programmed to discriminate in use of force against whites versus blacks versus -insert minority group here-. Which means the "seven year old white boy tased in eye, causing loss of eye, for stealing $1.23 chocolate bar" headline would be just around the corner.

I think robots are destined for 'law enforcement' but not as much in the 'force'ment part. It would be cheaper, safer, and quieter to have a robot (or more likely a drone) simply follow you until human law enforcement arrives.

Everything on video, the 'company' didn't harm you, and then real (human) law enforcement can proceed to pound you into the pavement. /s

If you side with anyone shooting an unarmed child, you're a monster.

Racist robots are so common it made it into American sitcoms almost a decade ago.

What if the child is Hitler?

Some people are getting upset. As long as we're an authoritarian nation I think we're going to end up with violent robots. And the same folks covering facebook in all lives matter and the thin blue line propaganda will be right there continuing the tradition. There are hardcore democrats that don't even care about drone strikes anymore.

No jury, everyone has signed an arbitration agreement.

We're not at "upon entering this store you agree to..." contracts yet, and STOP GIVING THEM IDEAS! :-P

Efficiency, savings, less pushback from customers and employees. For one thing you're piecemealing out the upgrades over time, making the transition between people and robot easier on management. For another you only need one or two bots doing constant circuits for inventory checking while you can have an army of bots do the stocking that people are currently doing. I'd imagine that a single purpose bot would be cheaper than an all purpose bot until each individual function's technology is more ubiquitous.

Plus if a single purpose bot goes out of commission you haven't lost 4 primary functions, 2 secondary functions, and your taser security detail (multi-bot). You've just lost the re-stacker. The weekend stacker comes online until the other is fixed.