Autonomous mobile robotic systems and methods for picking and put-away

This patent covers a logistics-facility automation system built around a central server coordinating one or more autonomous mobile robots. Grounded in claim 1, the protected combination is specific and hardware-centric: a mobile base with a flat top surface and a horizontal cavity in its front portion housing a centrally positioned laser ranging device; the cavity is shaped so it slopes toward the back on both left and right sides, creating an opening that gives the laser a 270-degree field of view on a horizontal plane parallel to the floor. The base also has an internal cavity with a back-side opening that accepts a field-replaceable battery, plus onboard robot processors, a remote communication device, and memory holding executable instructions. In plain terms, the claim is less about the high-level picking algorithm and more about the physical sensor geometry and serviceable-battery layout of the robot platform — the abstract frames the broader purpose as autonomous picking and put-away of items, totes, and cases, with optional transport robots coordinated by the remote server.

The assignee is IAM Robotics, with six named inventors (Galluzzo, Altman, Cameron, Grill, Renfrew, and Manian). The patent was granted in 2023. Its family is 5 members across 3 countries, indicating a focused rather than aggressive international filing strategy — protection in a few key jurisdictions rather than a broad global net. Forward citations stand at 1, which is expected for a 2023 grant: the patent is too recent to have accumulated meaningful citation history, so the low count reflects publication lag rather than low value, and likely indicates strategic IP that citation-weighted ranking under-rewards at this stage.

Where this patent stands: This is best read as a defensive continuation/refinement within IAM Robotics' own portfolio rather than a foundational filing. The company's anchor patent is the much earlier and heavily cited US-9785911-B2 (95 citations, 15-member family), which established the mobile-manipulation piece-picking concept; the subject patent narrows down to concrete mechanical and sensor-placement details (the sloped horizontal cavity, the 270-degree laser geometry, the field-replaceable battery) that protect the specifics of a commercial robot platform. It sits alongside other IAM filings (US-11348066-B2 and US-11945649-B2) as part of a coherent build-out around the same product line. Relative to the field's larger players — Amazon, Dematic, and warehouse-automation specialists — IAM is a smaller, focused operator using targeted hardware claims to fence its specific robot design rather than to claim the broad category.

The surrounding space is densely clustered and technologically narrow — this is a mature, well-populated warehouse-automation niche. The technology concentration confirms how tight the cluster is: Conveyors & Material Handling (B65G) runs at 131.3× the corpus baseline, Lifting & Hoisting (B66F) at 121.1×, and Robotics (B25J) at 110.1× — three areas all an order of magnitude above corpus norms, evidence that this is a tightly bounded field rather than a diffuse one. On citation impact, the dominant names from the top-assignee list are Amazon Technologies (7 patents, 339 citations — by far the most prolific filer here), followed by legacy material-handling players such as CasePick Systems, Distrobot Systems, Dematic, and NextShift Robotics. IAM Robotics itself does not appear in the citation-ranked top assignees despite owning four of the nearest patents — its IP is recent and not yet citation-weighted.

Closest related patents:

• US-9785911-B2 — System and method for piece-picking or put-away with a mobile manipulation robot (I AM Robotics · 95 citations · 15-member family). This is IAM's foundational filing and the direct conceptual parent of the subject patent; the 2023 patent refines the platform hardware that this earlier patent introduced at a system level.
• US-11348066-B2 — System and method for piece picking or put-away with a mobile manipulation robot (IAM Robotics · 7 citations · 2-member family) and US-11945649-B2 — Bin retrieval and transport systems and methods (IAM Robotics · 0 citations · 5-member family). Both are sibling filings in the same portfolio; US-11945649-B2 (2024) is on-point and lightly cited — strategic IP the citation-weighted score under-rewards.
• US-9550624-B2 — Autonomous mobile picking (Dematic Corp · 72 citations · 24-member family). A heavily protected competitor filing covering the same autonomous-picking function from a major material-handling incumbent, with a far broader international family.
• US-9120622-B1 — Autonomous order fulfillment and inventory control robots (InVia Robotics · 375 citations · 13-member family). The most heavily cited near-neighbor and a core reference for autonomous fulfillment robots, illustrating how crowded the general concept is and why IAM's claims lean on specific hardware geometry.

The field is commercial/corporate, not academic — the nearest assignees are robotics companies and warehouse-automation vendors (Amazon, Dematic, InVia, Grey Orange, 6 River Systems, Alert Innovation), so freedom-to-operate considerations weigh more heavily here than licensing from universities. Given that the broad autonomous-picking concept is well anchored by older, heavily cited patents (Distrobot's US-6950722-B2 at 215 citations, CasePick