Decathlon automated seven of its European warehouses using Exotec robots to sort and pack items for brick-and-mortar stores. The sporting goods retailer reported productivity gains at these facilities.

At the Portugal warehouse, the number of orders the site can prepare increased from 57,000 to 114,000, according to Decathlon. The warehouse can now replenish 73 stores, up from 41 stores before the automation.

At a warehouse in France, the number of stores it can replenish increased from 37 to 73, a Decathlon spokesperson said.

The automation reduced physical demands on warehouse workers. At its logistics site in the UK, walking distance for pickers decreased from over 6 miles to under 1 mile per day, according to Decathlon. Workplace incidents related to order picking at the UK site decreased from 1 per 5,000 orders to 1 per 10,000 orders.

Worker assignments changed after the robot installations. At one site, 50 people were designated pickers before Skypods were installed, an Exotec spokesperson said. After installation, the number of designated pickers dropped to 12, with other workers reassigned to different tasks.

Exotec's Skypod system consists of wheeled robots that can move, store, and retrieve hundreds of thousands of items a day from storage bins stacked on their heads. The robots can move three-dimensionally, attaching to proprietary storage racks to climb up to about 46 feet.

Exotec's proposed warehouse automation system automates the entire flow of goods from arrival to shipment and can include 150 to 200 Skypods, automatic depalletizers, automatic palletizers, carton-opening machines, and RFID tunnels that scan items on a conveyor belt. Exotec's robotics platform can reduce a warehouse's footprint to as small as 65,000 square feet, compared to an average warehouse size of about 194,000 square feet, the Exotec CEO said.

Companies can dedicate additional space to shelving items or to other operations when using Exotec's robotics platform, the Exotec CEO said.

Decathlon operates more than 1,800 stores with 101,000 employees, according to the company. Exotec is a French startup that specializes in warehouse robots and automation systems for moving goods.