Tumbling and pushing of orthogonal-box-shaped retail products for shelf replenishment

This video demonstrates a MANIBOT supermarket use-case integration experiment for shelf replenishment in a lab setup. It showcases the robot interacting with orthogonal-box products arranged in a tight formation on a mock retail shelf. Specifically, the demonstration highlights the system's ability to declutter the products using the non-prehensile tumbling primitive in order to create the necessary grasping affordances. After the product is tumbled and the necessary grasping affordances have been created, the robot grasps and transfers it to the shelf, where additional non-prehensile primitives, i.e. front and side pushes, are executed to achieve tight shelving. This supports the development of MANiBOT’s manipulation capabilities for handling diverse products in future retail automation scenarios. This video presents ongoing research and integration work within the MANiBOT project. Funded by the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 101120823. Views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union.