Seegrid’s self-driving vehicles have travelled the equivalent of 40 times around the earth without being responsible for any safety incidents.
The driverless material handling machines, deployed at various customer warehouses, reached one million production miles without having to report a single personnel safety issue. The milestone means that the company’s automated guided vehicles (AGV) have logged more incident-free miles than any equivalent AGV from rivals.
A Seegrid spokesman said, “As the first and only company to hit this one million accident-free mile mark, our intelligent AGVs are leading the industry not just in productivity but also in safety. “Every day, Seegrid self-driving vehicles reliably move material for some of the largest manufacturing and distribution companies in the world, including Amazon, General Motors, Whirlpool, and Boeing.”
According to the US Department of Labor’s OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration), someone in the USA dies every three days in a forklift accident and each year 34,900 serious injuries occur.
Jeff Burnstein, president of the Robotic Industries Association, said, “One million accident-free miles is a remarkable accomplishment, considering the complex and dynamic nature of today’s industrial facilities, and it highlights the maturation of this automation market, which we expect to continue growing as demand for self-driving vehicles rises globally.”
A combination of stereo cameras and perception technology allows Seegrid AGVs to build a 360° map of the world around them and adapt to the changing environment.
“These self-driving vehicles have reduced the number of miles driven by the team members who work in our retail support centers, allowing us to redeploy our staff to more value-added roles while improving overall safety,” said Joe Hurley, senior vice president of supply chain at Giant Eagle. “They travel on predefined routes and follow all safety rules, creating an environment of efficiency and predictability.”
