Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is again embracing automation by releasing a legion of robots to take over roles that were once the responsibility of humans.

In its battle to outsmart Amazon.com Inc., the store chain will deploy automotive technology in various areas, which will mean thousands of robots working with humans. In total, there will be 1,500 bots tasked with floor cleaning, 1,200 FAST Unloaders on top of the 500 already in use, 900 new Pickup Towers and 300 more shelf scanners.

The floor cleaner, called “Auto-C,” was made with the start-up Brain Corp. Walmart already had 360 of them scrubbing the floors, but it seems they have been successful, so the store has now bumped that number up to 1,860 in total. According to a Walmart blog, it’s just faster and better at cleaning than humans.

The FAST unloader automatically scans and sorts items unloaded from trucks so they can reach the shelves more quickly. These work in tandem with shelf scanners, which make sure everything is in the right place and correctly priced. If an item is then bought online, it might make its way to a Pickup Tower, which is pretty much a large vending machine.

In its blog post there is a recurring theme, and that is that Walmart sees the robots as a “sidekick” for human staff, likening such technologies to Star Wars’ R2D2. The post might allay fears that robots are coming for your job, with the company not talking about job replacement but getting rid of “repeatable, predictable and manual” tasks to give employees time to perform less mundane work.

Retail is changing, and we’re changing with it. Read about our latest in-store sidekicks and how they’re helping associates save the day. https://t.co/BD3gi9mXgU pic.twitter.com/6885J8z1iQ

— Walmart Inc. (@WalmartInc) 9 เมษายน 2562

“Walmart has been pioneering new technologies to minimize the time an associate spends on the more mundane and repetitive tasks like cleaning floors or checking inventory on a shelf,” said Elizabeth Walker of Walmart’s corporate affairs. “This gives associates more of an opportunity to do what they’re uniquely qualified for: serve customers face-to-face on the sales floor.”

Image: Walmart