Amazon’s Innovation Lab in Vercelli is one of the most advanced centers in Europe for innovation, robotics, and new technologies. Here, innovative tools for reducing packaging, primarily paper-based, are tested. Efficiency, safety, and sustainability are key parameters, with significant reductions in paper consumption, energy use, and sealing adhesives
Optimizing an industrial process primarily means gaining efficiency and aiming for a concrete reduction in costs. A vision where materials can also play a leading role when the ability to broaden the perspective leads to new technologies capable of reducing consumption and developing new supports. This is one of the many interesting results produced by Amazon’s Operations Innovation Labs, research centers where technologies are studied and developed to serve their processes. One of the three labs dedicated to mechatronics and robotics is located in Vercelli, the only one outside the USA, and not without reason. “Projects are developed internally, as well as the software,” explains Stefano La Rovere, Director of Amazon Mechatronics. “But several components are made by partners, and in the mechatronics field, this area is particularly reliable.” It’s no coincidence that in the last five years, the company has invested over 700 million euros in the sector, resulting in the creation of about a thousand technologies, serving all operational centers around the world. These technologies aim primarily at productivity, including safety and ergonomics of workstations, while not neglecting sustainability. Packaging plays an important role in these aspects, both in terms of shape and materials chosen as alternatives to traditional cardboard boxes. Achieving improvements in these non-trivial areas is certainly an interesting result. The task of the Vercelli Operations Innovation Lab is to develop industrial robotics and mechatronics technologies, capable of machine learning and utilizing artificial intelligence to improve the flow inside a sorting center.
From plastic to custom paper
Among the developed technologies, some are directly related to material management. A particularly significant project resulted in the Automated Packaging Technology. Derived from a common machine for packing products in plastic containers, it works instead with specially studied paper support and some modifications. The automatic packaging technology creates custom paper envelopes by scanning items and calculating the right amount of material required, thus reducing consumption to the minimum compared to traditional pre-sized cardboard boxes. The machine is dedicated to packaging individual items, such as video games, sports equipment, and office products, ensuring a durable and flexible package. Additionally, thanks to heat sealing technology, each envelope is sealed without the use of glue, minimizing empty spaces and providing greater stability for the contents. The envelope is thinner than those previously used and employs 100% recycled and recyclable paper. Its perfect adaptation to the product also means no need for padding. According to Amazon’s calculations, these machines help avoid the use of more than 26 grams of packaging per shipment on average. The envelopes are up to 90% lighter than similar-sized cardboard boxes. These are important considerations for sustainability, and therefore, the image, but also very concrete. In addition to savings on packaging material, there are also reduced package volumes, which lowers transportation costs.
Right label in the right place
There are also situations where packaging can be entirely eliminated. This applies to products with original packaging that already provides adequate protection during transport. In these cases, it is still necessary to apply labels for internal sorting and delivery processes. By eliminating standard boxes, the challenge here is the highly variable shapes of the packages, which makes it difficult to determine the appropriate label size and find the ideal spot for application. The solution was found in the Universal Robotic Labeller, an automatic high-speed labeling technology that improves placement and adhesion on irregular surfaces, while also choosing the most suitable label size from three options.
Sustainability pays off
In most cases, companies view sustainability primarily as a cost, often linked to marketing or even as a chore with no return. Thanks to the research from the Operations Innovation Lab, with the one in Vercelli at the forefront, Amazon is able to demonstrate its economic advantages as well. The reduction in packaging material use is now a consolidated achievement, and process optimization and automation translate into less energy consumption, fewer errors, and less waste. This is an example worth sharing beyond the company, useful for the supply chain or anyone facing similar situations. “Our main task is dealing with the collection and recycling of materials,” explains Amelio Cecchini, President of Comieco, during a visit to Amazon’s Vercelli center. “However, we also guide companies toward eco-design of products and packaging. An important aspect to reduce waste.” When done carefully, and ready to transform into a revenue source, or at least a cost reduction, selecting and disposing of materials correctly can become an investment. This consideration is especially relevant to municipalities and waste management agencies, although companies are not excluded from this responsibility. “If we consider the paper supply chain,” continues Cecchini, “we can consider ourselves a virtuous country. We have moved from importers to exporters. This is no small feat, especially since we have developed a sector that employs 170,000 people.”