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Amazon's New Warehouses May Process Packages 2.5 Times Faster With Far Fewer Workers

1 month 2 weeks ago

Amazon's New Warehouses May Process Packages 2.5 Times Faster With Far Fewer Workers

Amazon is developing a new warehouse concept aimed at automating one of the most stubbornly manual parts of online retail: preparing a chaotic mix of packages for the final trip to customers’ homes, according to Business Insider.

Known internally as Project Tetromino, the proposed facilities would sit at the end of Amazon’s logistics network. Packages would arrive from fulfillment centers and then be sorted, temporarily stored, placed in delivery order and staged for drivers with far less human involvement than at current delivery stations. The name appears to reference the geometric pieces in Tetris, an appropriate metaphor for the difficult task of arranging parcels of different shapes and sizes into limited storage space and delivery vans.

According to an internal planning document reviewed by Business Insider, Amazon had considered spending $103 million on a pilot facility in 2028, followed by five additional stations in 2029 and another 10 in 2030. The five facilities planned for 2029 were estimated to cost roughly $85 million each, which would take the project’s cumulative investment beyond $530 million by the end of that year. The proposed system was expected to handle packages at approximately 2.5 times the rate of Amazon’s existing delivery-station design.

Insider writes that one possible component of the project is technology from Boxbot, an AI-powered logistics robotics company. Its system takes packages from conveyor belts, moves them into storage trays and then uses software to arrange their release in the sequence needed for delivery. Boxbot says this approach can make the vehicle-loading stage as much as 10 times faster, although that is the company’s own performance claim and is not necessarily Amazon’s projection for Tetromino as a whole.

The concept forms part of Amazon’s much broader effort to automate its shipping network. The company has already said it expects to more than double the number of robotic arms it operates during 2026. Other logistics companies are moving in the same direction: FedEx is using AI-equipped Dexterity robots to load trailers, while UPS and DHL have deployed robotic systems for unloading freight.

Amazon cautioned that Tetromino remains an early-stage idea, however.

A spokesperson confirmed that the company continues to test technologies intended to improve safety and the customer experience, but disputed the reported spending estimates and construction schedule, saying the figures in the internal document no longer reflected its current plans. So while the project offers a window into Amazon’s automation ambitions, the proposed investment and rollout should be treated as preliminary rather than settled.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/25/2026 - 15:40

Tyler Durden

Washington Backs Brazil's Serra Verde Mine In $1.55 Billion Rare-Earth Push

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1 month 2 weeks ago

Washington Backs Brazil's Serra Verde Mine In $1.55 Billion Rare-Earth Push

The U.S. Department of War has announced a $750 million investment aimed at securing long-term supplies of critical rare-earth elements from Serra Verde’s Pela Ema mine in central Brazil, as Washington accelerates efforts to reduce its dependence on China for strategically important minerals, according to a DOW press release out this week.

The investment, announced Aug. 24 through the department’s Economic Defense Unit and Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment program, will support an offtake agreement for mixed rare-earth carbonates produced by Serra Verde. It forms part of a broader $1.55 billion financing and purchasing structure that also includes a $300 million commitment from the Defense Logistics Agency and $500 million from a major commercial bank.

The release says that the agreement is intended to give the U.S. and its allies more reliable access to dysprosium, terbium, neodymium and praseodymium.

These elements are crucial inputs for high-performance permanent magnets used across advanced defense systems, including fighter aircraft, nuclear submarines, guided missiles, satellites and drones. They are also increasingly important to electric transportation, energy infrastructure, aerospace and electronics.

China currently dominates several stages of the global rare-earth supply chain, particularly processing and magnet manufacturing. U.S. officials have consequently made the development of alternative “mine-to-magnet” supply chains a national-security and industrial-policy priority.

“By partnering with Serra Verde, we are taking a decisive step to break our adversaries’ near-monopoly on rare-earth elements,” Assistant Secretary of War for Industrial Base Policy Mike Cadenazzi said in the announcement.

The latest commitment follows a separate $565 million financing agreement for Serra Verde’s Pela Ema project through the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation. Together with efforts by the Department of Commerce to expand domestic magnet manufacturing, the investments point to a broader strategy: securing raw materials from allied and partner countries while building enough processing and manufacturing capacity to keep strategically important supply chains outside Chinese control.

If successful, the Serra Verde initiative could become an important piece of that strategy. Rather than simply funding additional mineral production, Washington is using financing, government purchasing commitments and private capital to create guaranteed demand for a non-Chinese source of rare earths, helping underpin an alternative supply chain from the mine through to the advanced magnets used in both military and commercial technologies.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/25/2026 - 15:20

Tyler Durden

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