![]() ![]() Historically, we were a printing company that made barcode labels, and then we acquired a mobile computing business from Motorola, and today we have a variety of devices that do sensing, analyzing, and acting-we’ve been getting increasingly involved in automation in general.Ī lot of our major customers are retailers, warehousing, transportation and logistics, or healthcare, and what we’ve heard a lot lately is that there is an increased pressure towards trying to figure out how to run a supply chain efficiently. Jim Lawton: Zebra is a combination of companies that have come together over time. IEEE Spectrum: Can you tell us about Zebra’s background and interest in robotics? To find out where robots fit into all of this, and to learn more about what this means for Fetch, we spoke with Melonee Wise, CEO of Fetch, and Jim Lawton, Vice President and General Manager of Robotics Automation at Zebra. They got into RFID in the early 2000s, and then acquired Motorola’s enterprise unit in 2014, giving Zebra a huge mobile technology portfolio. While Zebra was founded in 1969, the Zebra-ness didn’t come into play until the early 1980s when they started making barcode printers and scanners. According to Fortune, as of 2020 they were the 581st biggest company in the world (just behind Levi Strauss) with a market value of $25 billion. But what about Zebra Technologies? As far as I can make out, Zebra is one of those companies that you’ve probably never heard of but is actually enormous and everywhere. This is why Fetch makes sense as an acquisition target, I think: they’ve got exceptional technology in an area (fulfillment, mostly) that has been undergoing a huge amount of growth and where robotics has an enormous opportunity. ![]() ![]() There are plenty of other companies in the larger AMR space, but from what we understand, what Fetch has been doing for the last five years has been consistently state of the art. Their autonomous mobile robots work outside of warehouses as well, most recently by providing disinfection services for places like airports. ![]() Most of what Fetch Robotics does is warehouse logistics-moving stuff from one place to another so that humans don’t have to. But in any case, Fetch was a fresh start that allowed them to fully develop their concept for an intelligent, robust, and efficient autonomous mobile robotic system. The founders all worked at Willow Garage, and Unbounded was a mobile manipulation-focused spin-off of Willow that didn’t pan out for reasons that are still not super clear. And when it does, it will in some ways mark the end of a robotics story that we’ve been following for the better part of a decade.įetch Robotics was founded in early 2015 by the same team of robot experts who had founded Unbounded Robotics just two years before. There are still some “customary closing conditions” and regulatory approvals that need to happen, so everything isn’t expected to get wrapped up for another month or so. Zebra, meanwhile, does stuff with barcodes (get it?), and has been actively investing in robotics companies with a goal of increasing its footprint in the intelligent industrial automation space.Īccording to the press release, the acquisition “will provide an innovative offering that drives greater efficiencies and higher ROI through better orchestration of technology and people.” We have no idea what that means, but fortunately, we’ve been able to speak with both Fetch and Zebra for details about the deal.įetch Robotics’ $305 million purchase price includes $290 million in cash to snap up the 95% of Fetch that Zebra doesn’t already own-Zebra had already invested in Fetch through Zebra Ventures, which also has Locus Robotics and Plus One robotics in its portfolio. A company called Zebra Technologies announced this morning that it intends to acquire Fetch Robotics for an impressive $305 million.įetch is best known for its autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) for warehouses and boasts “the largest portfolio of AMRs in the industry,” and we’re particular fans of its one-armed mobile manipulator for research. ![]()
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