Petersen delays warehouse automation capex, fearing rapid robotics progress will cause obsolescence
Ryan Petersen · Flexport's New AI Products and the Future of Port Automation · Feb 28, 2025 · at 14:40
Flexport CEO Ryan Petersen discusses warehouse automation and how rapidly evolving robotics affects capital expenditure decisions for fulfillment networks.
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“It's I'm very much wait and see it's the human rights are making enough progress that it's really causing me to second guess how much I want to spend on capex and a big automated system right now in a fulfillment center, because. You know, three years from now, I don't want to have this, the life cycle on that investment, they probably like. 1015 years at least. Right. Not hopefully it can pay back faster than that. It would have to, before we invested, but like, It's gonna, it's gotta last that long. I'm not gonna replace it. And I could just totally imagine I have this like giant expensive system that three years from now is just obsolete because progress in humanoids or other types of robotics.”
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