SA | Mercado Libre has entered a commercial agreement with Agility Robotics that signals a more practical phase for humanoid robots in large-scale logistics operations.
The partnership will see Agility’s humanoid robot Digit deployed within Mercado Libre’s fulfilment network, beginning with operations at the company’s site in San Antonio, Texas.
For the food and beverage manufacturing and logistics community, the announcement is less about spectacle and more about what it says regarding the next stage of warehouse automation.
Agility Robotics has positioned Digit as a robot designed to work in environments built for people, rather than requiring facilities to be redesigned around machines. That distinction matters.
Many fulfilment centres, including those supporting FMCG and food distribution, still rely on layouts, shelving and workflows optimised for human movement.
Digit’s bipedal form allows it to move through aisles, handle totes and transport goods without major changes to infrastructure. This lowers the barrier to adoption and makes humanoid robotics commercially credible rather than experimental.
Mercado Libre’s interest lies squarely in operational resilience. The company operates one of the most complex logistics networks in the Americas, supporting millions of daily orders. Like many operators, it faces persistent labour challenges, particularly for physically demanding and repetitive tasks.
The deployment of Digit is intended to support human teams by taking on these tasks, reducing physical strain and allowing staff to focus on higher value activities such as quality control, exception handling and system oversight.
According to Agility Robotics, Digit is already operating in real-world commercial environments and has completed significant volumes of work, providing confidence in its safety and reliability. The robot is designed to autonomously pick up and move objects, navigate shared spaces and recover from disruptions without constant human intervention.
This level of autonomy is critical in fulfilment settings where unpredictability is the norm rather than the exception.
A key element of the agreement is Agility’s Arc automation platform, which allows Digit to integrate with existing warehouse management systems and other forms of automation. Rather than operating as a standalone novelty, the humanoid robot becomes part of a broader digital and physical workflow.
For manufacturers and logistics providers, this integrated approach is often the difference between a pilot project and a scalable solution.
The commercial agreement also reflects a broader shift in how robotics companies are engaging with enterprise customers. Agility Robotics has been clear that its focus is on repeatable, revenue-generating deployments, not one-off demonstrations. Mercado Libre, in turn, is using its scale to test how humanoid robots perform under genuine commercial pressure.
For the food and beverage supply chain, the implications are clear. Humanoid robots are moving out of theory and into facilities that operate around the clock, under cost pressure and with little tolerance for downtime.
This partnership suggests that humanoid robotics is no longer a future concept, but an emerging tool for improving efficiency, safety and continuity in modern fulfilment operations.
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