Ocado is using an army of 2,000 robots in its East London fulfilment centre

It may look like a nightmare sequence from a science fiction film, but a network of fast-working robots is now hard at work in East London. British grocery giant Ocado is using an army of robots at its 563,000 square foot warehouse in Erith next to the Thames to gather up items for customer orders. More than 2,000 robots are working there non-stop for 20 hours a day, each picking up to 2 million food items in a shift – far beyond the capability of a human worker. The eight-wheeled robots scoot around a giant grid-like structure called the'Hive', so-called for its honeycomb-like holes that contain inventory. Powered by an algorithm, the robots pick up crates of items to take to a human to put into shopping bags for delivery.