Kiva Systems Founded
Kiva Systems Founded refers to the 2003 start of Kiva Systems, a Massachusetts company created by Mick Mountz with Peter Wurman and Raffaello D'Andrea to build mobile robots that bring storage shelves to warehouse workers.
What happened and why it matters
Kiva introduced the goods-to-person robot model that now runs inside many large fulfillment centers. Mountz, who had seen the cost of order picking at Webvan, designed small drive units that lift and carry shelving pods to pick stations, with software that assigns tasks and decides where pods are stored. Staples was the first customer, installing a system in 2006. Amazon bought Kiva in 2012 for $775 million and renamed it Amazon Robotics, which pushed other vendors to build similar systems for retailers and 3PLs. When operators compare mobile robots, shuttles and cube storage today, they are weighing descendants of Kiva's approach.