Medline announces AI robotics partnership with Symbotic

Medline (MDLN) announced a strategic agreement to implement next-generation warehouse automation from Symbotic, an AI-enabled robotics technology company, as part of the company’s ongoing efforts to strengthen the resiliency, efficiency and scalability of the healthcare supply chain. Medline is the first healthcare company to deploy this technology. The Symbotic System is an AI-powered platform that automates picking, storage and retrieval of items for distribution. Widely used across multiple complex industries, including large scale retail and consumer goods companies, the technology uses intelligent, autonomous robots to depalletize and singulate inbound full pallets, store and retrieve items, and build orders into smart outbound pallets mapped to the needs and layouts of downstream recipients, helping to drive faster and more efficient operations. Medline will pilot this technology in 2027 at one of its 45 distribution centers in the U.S.