Zhi DongXi (public number: zhidxcom)
Author | Li Shuiqing
Edit | Heart edge
Zhidong reported on April 8 that yesterday, AIoT Company Megvii launched a new product of self-developed intelligent pallet four-way car, and shared several combinations of four-way vehicle and AMR robot, mechanical arm depalletizing and other "partner" gameplay.
Behind the 80 four-way trucks flowing between stacked shelves, behind megvii's self-developed "Megvii River Map" software platform is doing real-time traffic dispatch like a "brain". Tang Wenbin, co-founder of Megvii, said at the meeting: "As far as I know, this should also be the world's largest four-way vehicle system. ”
During the release, Zhi dong and a small number of media conducted an online interview with Lu Jianping, senior vice president of Megvii. When Zhidong asked about the generalizability of the Megvii River Chart four-way vehicle cluster scheduling case, Lu Jianping told us that because the biggest feature of the Megvii intelligent pallet four-way vehicle is hardware standardization and software modularization, it is very reproducible.
Xu Qingcai, head of Megvii's logistics business unit, said: "The future logistics system integration will be freely combined and selected like a menu! ”
▲Xu Qingcai, head of Megvii Logistics Business Division
Smart logistics is one of The Three Major Businesses of Megvii, also known as "Megvii Robot", and is a major output port for Megvii to use AI technology to help enterprises do the digital and intelligent transformation of the supply chain. Since 2017, when I ventured into logistics and released MegVision's self-developed MegBot series autonomous mobile robot and Megvii River Map software, Megvii's product matrix is becoming more complete.
First, to solve the pain points of the stacker, Megvii four-way vehicle solution to save 65% of electricity bills
The mainland is a big manufacturing country, and in logistics warehousing, palletized solutions are in high demand. As the name suggests, a pallet solution is simply to place products on pallets for storage, handling and picking.
There are some pain points in this industry for a long time. Before the release of the new product, Megvii co-founder Tang Wenbin reviewed this.
▲Megvii co-founder Tang Wenbin
Faced with the demand for pallet solutions, the common solution in the industry is forklift flat storage. This scheme is essentially a manual warehouse, often requiring the configuration of forklift trucks and the hiring of some forklift workers for handling. However, this solution relies on a large number of labor and insufficient storage density, which is increasingly challenging.
▲Forklift type flat library (picture from the network)
In order to solve these problems, the stacker crane vertical warehouse came into being. This scheme has a higher space utilization rate and higher efficiency in and out of the warehouse, but the heavy machinery investment is large, the space restriction is large, the delivery cycle is long, and the power consumption after completion is large, which also leads to a limited scope of application.
▲Stacker crane library (picture from the network)
Is there a higher return on investment and more scalable solution?
To this end, Megvii has launched a new self-developed intelligent pallet four-way vehicle system. Tang Wenbin said that unlike the stacker, the four-way car can run flexibly on the shelf, and there is no special requirement for the shape of the shelf, which can effectively avoid interference with fire protection, HVAC, lighting, columns, beams and other obstacles in the building, and achieve a more flexible pallet solution.
Take, for example, a project for a raw material manufacturer that needs 8,000 storage bits and supports continuous production 24 hours a day. It is said that under the same area, compared with the stacker crane program, the space utilization rate of the Megvii four-way vehicle program has increased by more than 20%, the cost of pallets has been saved by more than 40%, the project implementation cycle has been shortened by more than 50%, the electricity cost has been saved by more than 65%, and the installed capacity has been reduced by more than 65%.
Second, the fuselage is only 125mm thick, and the operating efficiency of comprehensive working conditions is increased by 30%.
At the meeting, Fang Dianjun, chief scientist of the Fraunhofer Logistics Research Institute in Germany, pointed out that although the earliest technical concept of four-way vehicle originated in Europe, the Chinese market is rich in application scenarios, and now in terms of structural design and intelligent scheduling software, Chinese companies are already in the first echelon of the world.
As a player who cuts from AI algorithms to smart logistics, Megvii intelligent pallet four-way vehicles have some obvious differences from similar products on the market.
Tang Wenbin pointed out that the normal temperature version and cold storage version of the PS1500 launched by Megvii this time have the following characteristics:
1, ultra-thin: the thickness of the fuselage is only 125mm, it is said to be one of the thinnest four-way vehicles actually put into use on the market.
2. Ultra-fast: no-load reversing time is 2.5s, load reversing time is 3.5s, lifting time is 2.5s, and no-load acceleration is 2m/s2, which realizes the comprehensive working condition operation efficiency by 30%.
3. Ultra-stable: Based on Megvii's mature robot platform, it is the same platform as Megvii T series and S series AMR, and the main body software system, power management system, chip controller, two-dimensional code camera, etc. are fully reused, and the platform has been verified by many AMR deliveries.
4, super safe: obstacle avoidance laser *6 (Easy To measure, German industrial laser ranging sensor), pallet detection *3 (Panasonic photoelectric switch), lithium iron phosphate battery / lithium titanate battery (battery cell from Ningde times / Toshiba), the core components are selected from the head supplier, the quality is strict and guaranteed.
5, ultra-long endurance: battery capacity of 60Ah, power consumption of 40W, charging current of 50A, can be charged for 1 hour, continuous work for 8 hours.
Since its involvement in logistics in 2017, Megvii has released Megvii's self-developed MegBot series of autonomous mobile robots and Megvii River Map software. The intelligent pallet four-way vehicle system released this time is a more flexible and innovative solution around the pallet storage and handling scenario.
Xu Qingcai said that what Megvii is mainly doing at present is to provide AAA smart logistics solution products:
The first "A" refers to AS/RS, which is what we often call an automated three-dimensional warehousing system; the second "A" is AMR, that is, Megvii's self-developed autonomous mobile robot system of various categories; the third "A" is a smart logistics software platform "Megvii River Map" with Megvii's own AI technology as the core, which we call the warehouse brain.
Third, and AMR, mechanical arm combination work, there is a "brain" behind the scheduling
So how does Megvii implement the 3A smart logistics strategy? At this press conference, Tang Wenbin shared several cases of four-way vehicles working with some "partners".
"We have some four-way vehicle projects that have been delivered or are being implemented. There are some partners under different schemes that can make our scheme more flexible. Tang Wenbin said.
1. Megvii four-way vehicle + AMR: four-way vehicle three-dimensional storage + AMR ground pallet handling, instead of "stacker + conveyor line", more flexible, space utilization rate greatly improved, less total investment, short project implementation cycle.
2. Megvii four-way vehicle + depalletizing robot: four-way truck pallet storage + robotic arm depalletizing, to achieve fully unmanned whole box picking; use the same mechanical arm for depalletizing and mixing palletizing, directly complete the aggregation of outbound pallets; at night, the mechanical arm can be used to merge with the SKU's pallets to improve space utilization.
3. Megvii four-way vehicle + visual inventory workstation: Based on Megvii computer vision technology, pallet counting and inventory can be carried out; non-working hours such as night can be used to carry out unmanned inventory of the whole warehouse; accurate counting to the box; photo archiving, easy to check back.
Why can a four-way vehicle be combined with its good partners to form so many interesting solutions?
This has to mention the software platform behind Megvii River Map, which is similar to a logistics system "brain", which controls all equipment and realizes the efficient coordination of various devices.
At present, many logistics peers have also launched the "smart logistics brain" program, so what are the advantages of Megvii River Map?
In this regard, Lu Jianping told us: "Software is a thing, we can talk about the concept of clustering and collaboration, talk about strategies and algorithms, but in the end, we actually see if there are real cases of landing." Tang Wenbin also said at the press conference: "How is our software system doing? Don't look at the ads to see the effect! ”
According to Lu Jianping, in a benchmarking project in the field of clothing, Megvii River Map dynamically manages more than 10,000 commodity SKUs and tens of thousands of warehouse locations, connects and dispatches more than 80 four-way vehicles in the whole warehouse, and dynamically collaborates and flexibly dispatches multiple processes to achieve efficient FCL picking. Allegedly, this should also be the largest four-way vehicle system in the world.
It is reported that Megvii Robot will provide customers with a variety of service forms. On the one hand, companies will provide services directly to end users, and at the same time, they also want to find more partners around the world to be integrated and move towards the final customer.
Conclusion: Let the logistics system be freely combined like a menu
At present, under the tide of digital-real integration, it is the consensus of the industry to automate and upgrade the factory warehouse and logistics center. Xu Qingcai, head of Megvii's logistics business unit, said: "The future logistics system integration can be freely combined and selected like a menu to achieve faster delivery! ”
It can be predicted that as AI head players steadily fight and deepen the tentacles of technology into the deep pain points of the industry, we will see a qualitative leap in the efficiency of the industrial chain of all walks of life, thereby promoting the rapid development of the digital economy.