Walmart opts for robotic floor cleaning

MINNEAPOLIS – Tennant Company has announced a deal with Walmart to provide the T7AMR (Autonomous Mobile Robot) autonomous floor cleaners – equipped with Brain Corp.’s self-driving operating system, BrainOS.

Brain Corp will provide its BrainOS technology to an additional 1,500 robotic floor cleaners across the U.S. by the end of the year. This deal will increase a previous announcement of 360 robotic floor cleaners powered by BrainOS operating in Walmart stores to a fleet totaling 1,860 machines. 

Tennant Company’s support of Walmart’s broad deployment of Tennant robotic cleaning equipment represents a significant step toward the adoption of autonomous cleaning equipment in the marketplace.

“We are proud to partner with Walmart, the first major global retailer to introduce autonomous cleaning robots to deliver operational efficiency, cleaning performance and customer value on a broad scale across a retail platform,” said Chris Killingstad, Tennant Company’s president and CEO.

“This new step in our long and valued relationship with Walmart exemplifies our deep commitment to both innovation and meeting the needs of our most sophisticated customers. We are excited about our combined potential.”

Robots powered by BrainOS operate collaboratively alongside Walmart associates by utilizing a simple and intuitive “teach and repeat” approach which allows associates to easily deploy the machine and adjust cleaning routes as the environment changes.

John Crecelius, Walmart senior VP of central operations, commented, “This cleaner is another great example of technology helping make the Walmart job better – rather than riding on a floor-cleaning machine for several hours, the associate is now working with robotics to complete their duties. The machine allows our associates more time to focus on completing other tasks within the role, but most importantly, it frees them up to serve our customers better.”

“We look forward to continuing our work by extending the footprint of BrainOS across Walmart store locations and applications,” said Dr. Eugene Izhikevich, CEO of Brain Corp.

“Brain Corp has experienced tremendous growth over the past year, which I believe is both a testament to our technology, as well as the growing commitment that innovation leaders are making to robotics and AI.”