Amazon Enhances Proteus Warehouse Robot with Natural Language Capabilities

Amazon upgrades Proteus robot, plans €10B European expansion, hiring 25,000.

Amazon has upgraded its Proteus warehouse robot and announced a significant expansion of its European logistics network, with investments exceeding €10 billion and the hiring of 25,000 employees.

TODAY: Amazon just announced a multi-year plan to invest over €10 billion to expand and modernize its European fulfillment centers, including hiring 25,000 new employees. The investment will include the launch of a next-generation autonomous robot and the expansion of systems… https://t.co/wn3yw5tfVo

— Amazon (@amazon) June 4, 2026

The announcement was made at the Delivering the Future event in London.

The new Proteus, unlike its predecessor, is designed to operate not only in loading zones but throughout the infrastructure where goods need to be moved. Its tasks include transporting containers upon arrival, moving them between workstations, and assisting staff in fulfillment centers and delivery sites.

The key change is its natural language processing capability. Employees can now assign tasks to the robot using everyday speech without technical commands or programming. Scott Dresser, Vice President of Amazon Robotics, explained that an employee simply needs to state what needs to be done, and the system will determine the priority, route, and timing of the task.

Proteus remains focused on physically demanding work, such as moving heavy carts over long distances. The previous version is used in 25 fulfillment centers in the US, transporting carts weighing nearly 400 kg.

The new Proteus is currently being tested in Amazon’s labs, with a European launch planned for the first half of 2027.

Simultaneously, Amazon is expanding its fleet of other robotic systems:

• STARK — a system for handling containers, which picks up full boxes from conveyors and places them on carts. Following a pilot in Barcelona, it is set to be deployed at 15 sites in Europe by 2027;
• Vulcan — a robot with tactile sensitivity — is already used for more complex item selection operations at a site in Hamburg after being developed for a facility in Spokane.

Armin Kossmann, Amazon’s Vice President of Operations in Europe, stated that the transformation is expected to be a “quantum leap” in supporting employees and serving customers.

In May, robots from Figure AI lost to a human in a 10-hour package sorting competition.