Interestingly, a recent key robotics breakthrough by Amazon isn’t humanoid form. It’s an AI-powered gripper system called Vulcan thay has the “sense of touch” and can handle 75% of Amazon’s 1 million unique items. The previous picking robots used machine vision and suction cups but couldn’t “feel” the items (they were built to handle packages and covered 50%-ish of warehouse items). Per CNBC, the new Vulcan gripper uses sensors and generative AI to apply different force to different items (eg. soft on bag of candies vs. hard on textbook). It also uses AI for solving stacking puzzles to minimize wasted space in a box (like Tetris).