FedEx Ramps Up Robot Trailer-Loading Trials as Warehouse Automation Race Accelerates
- Aug 7
- 2 min read
FedEx is scaling up its use of an AI-powered robot to load truck trailers at its Hagerstown, Maryland, hub, after several years of validation testing with startup Dexterity Inc. The expanded rollout will let FedEx evaluate Dexterity's system at a larger operational scale inside a high-volume logistics environment, informing future decisions on broader deployment. The Dexterity loader is also running at a facility in Tracy, California.
Loading and unloading trailers is one of the most physically demanding tasks in FedEx's package operations, and automating it has been difficult because of the huge variability in package size, weight, and loading conditions across thousands of trailers. Dexterity's system, powered by an AI model called Foresight, combines vision, depth, and touch to make real-time decisions about how to place packages for space, stability, and speed. Foresight drives Dexterity's dual-armed “human-like” robot, Mech, built for heavy industrial work while remaining compact enough to operate inside a trailer.
FedEx CEO Raj Subramaniam has described the challenge bluntly: “Truck unloading and truck loading are a very difficult problem for robotics to solve — packages come in every size, shape and weight. We're not looking for humanoid robots. We're looking for super humanoid robots because maybe they need to have a couple of elbows.” He said last month that FedEx hopes to begin scaling automated trailer unloading at more facilities within a couple of years.
FedEx is also piloting a separate unloading robot, the Scoop, from Berkshire Grey (a SoftBank subsidiary), which is designed for continuous, bulk automated trailer unloading and is expected to go live this year. That follows a multiyear relationship with Berkshire Grey that began with robotic package-sortation systems in 2021.
Elsewhere in the industry, Pickle Robot Company and Ambi Robotics announced they have integrated their systems into an end-to-end trailer-to-warehouse automation solution: Pickle's robots unload cases from trailers and feed them via conveyor into Ambi's AmbiStack system for scanning and stacking, without requiring facility redesigns. And in 2025, DHL Group agreed to deploy more than 1,000 additional units of Boston Dynamics' Stretch robot, which has reportedly reached unloading rates of up to 700 cases per hour.
Why it matters: Automating trailer loading and unloading could unlock significant cost savings for trucking and logistics companies while eliminating one of the most physically taxing tasks for warehouse workers.