Walmart Dares To Fire Inventory Tracking Robots

If there is a more efficient, less expensive way to get the job done, Walmart will find it.

For the last five years, Walmart has been leasing six-foot-tall inventory-tracking machines to roughly 500 Walmart stores from Bossa Nova Robotics.

This week, Walmart fired those robots.

This is one of those rare times when it was determined that humans were actually faster and more efficient at taking inventory.

Here is my concern: If you thought the humans were upset when they lost their jobs to a bunch of robots, imagine how upset the robots were when they found out that they just lost their jobs to a bunch of minimum wage humans.

There is not a robot union yet, but I guess Walmart doesn't do unions anyway.

These robots have a few big problems.

They never got paid in cash for their work, just fed electricity. They will no longer be able to plug in at Walmart, so where are they supposed to eat?

These robots did not have homes. During their time off they slept in the stock room. But they won't be allowed to do that anymore. So where do they go? Perhaps they will go back to the company who created them and ask if they can move back in.

But if they do move back in with their creators, they better find some work in the help wanted ads fast or they might be used for spare parts.

I'm just worried that this is 2020 and with all the rioting we have seen in our cities, the last thing we need is a robot rebellion,