Industry Brief, October 27, 2026: GXO expands Digit, Schaeffler humanoids, Hebe retrofit

By MillBrief Editorial · October 27, 2026

Three items today, two of them about humanoid robots and what their owners will and will not say about results. GXO is putting Agility’s Digit into two more warehouses, although its chief executive said in August that humanoids have not yet paid back. Schaeffler has opened a line in China where humanoids assemble parts for other humanoids. And a Polish drugstore chain shows what it takes to automate a warehouse it cannot rebuild or shut down. As always, vendor numbers are labelled as vendor numbers, and any arithmetic marked as ours is ours.

GXO adds two Digit sites, after saying humanoids have not paid back yet

GXO Logistics has signed a new commercial agreement to deploy Agility Robotics’ Digit humanoid at two more US facilities, in Statesville, North Carolina, and Lebanon, Tennessee, according to Agility’s October 26 announcement, published in an SEC filing by Churchill Capital Corp XI, the special-purpose acquisition company Agility plans to merge with. Deployments are expected to begin in early 2027 using Digit 4, and GXO plans to move to Digit 5 when it becomes commercially available. Digit has already moved more than 100,000 totes at GXO’s site in Flowery Branch, Georgia.

The Robot Report, covering the deal on October 26, adds the context a buyer needs. The companies describe the Georgia deployment as the first robots-as-a-service agreement for humanoids, with Digit moving totes and placing them onto conveyors alongside existing automation. GXO has also tested humanoids from Apptronik and Reflex Robotics. On its second-quarter earnings call in August, GXO CEO Patrick Kelleher said the company had run 45 humanoid pilots, had “not achieved ROI on humanoids yet,” and thought it was “a couple of years away” from that. GXO did not say how much it is investing in the expansion, or when it expects a return.

Why it matters: GXO calls itself the world’s largest pure-play contract logistics provider, with more than 150,000 employees. After 45 pilots it is expanding its use of Digit while saying openly that humanoids have not yet paid back. A mid-size plant should read that as permission to wait. If a vendor pitches you a humanoid for tote moves, ask for the rate per hour achieved at a running site, the share of time the robot was available, and what a service contract costs per robot per year. Then put those figures beside a conveyor or a mobile robot in a total cost of ownership comparison. Our payback guide shows how to set that up.

Sources: Agility Robotics via SEC Form 425, October 26, 2026; The Robot Report, October 26, 2026.

Schaeffler’s humanoids assemble parts for other humanoids

Schaeffler, the motion technology company, has opened what it calls a lighthouse factory for humanoid robotics in Taicang, China, Robotics & Automation News reported on October 26. The building covers about 7,500 square meters and holds an assembly line, a training and data collection center, a digital twin platform and a data center. On the line, six humanoids work at five stations, staging and sorting parts, joining them, and inspecting, labelling and packaging the result. The products are key joint modules for the next generation of humanoids, including linear and rotary actuators, and the site marks the start of Schaeffler’s mass production of these components.

In the training center, Schaeffler teaches humanoids tasks such as visual inspection, packaging, material transport, container moving and line-side replenishment, in setups modelled on conditions in its roughly 100 plants. A digital twin mirrors the line in real time, recording assembly accuracy, the duration of each step, energy use and equipment condition, so changes can be tested virtually first. Schaeffler says two new customers in the greater China region in the third quarter lifted its global incoming orders for humanoid robotics to some 400 million euros. That is a company figure, and the article does not give any output, cycle time or uptime data for the line.

Why it matters: The tasks on Schaeffler’s training list (replenishing the line, moving containers, packing) are the same jobs a mid-size plant might consider for a humanoid. But there are no performance figures yet, so treat this as a supplier building its own proof, not as evidence that the robots earn their keep. The part that may reach smaller buyers sooner is the supply chain: large component makers producing actuators in volume could, in time, lower the cost of robot joints generally. That is our expectation, not a claim in the article. Before committing to any of these tasks, ask what to automate first: a dull, repeatable job with a clear payback usually beats a showcase.

Source: Robotics & Automation News, October 26, 2026.

Retrofitting a warehouse that cannot stop shipping

Hebe, a Polish drugstore chain owned by the retail group Jerónimo Martins, has chosen the German supplier advasolutions to automate its existing warehouse, Robotics & Automation News reported on October 26. Hebe runs more than 400 stores in Poland as well as stores in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, plus a growing online business. The project is a tote storage system built in phases inside the existing building while the warehouse keeps working, with go-live scheduled for early 2028. It is advasolutions’ first facility outside Germany.

The racking spans ten aisles with 13 levels, about ten meters high, and holds roughly 20,000 standard totes of 600 x 400 mm. Sixty-six autonomous shuttles move totes inside the racks, with both automatic and manual battery swapping stations to keep them running across shifts. By our arithmetic that is about 300 tote locations per shuttle (20,000 / 66 = 303). Flow racks under the main storage hold fast-moving items, and the shuttles refill them, so pickers at the goods-to-person stations do not walk to restock. A reject lane diverts totes with unreadable barcodes or overfills, and the whole system connects to Hebe’s SAP warehouse management software.

Hebe’s supply chain and logistics director, Marcin Dopierala, said two conditions decided the choice: the system had to fit a building whose structure could not be changed, and it had to go in without interrupting outbound shipments. He said Hebe reached the performance it needed “with a very good payback period,” but no figure was given.

Why it matters: Many small and mid-size manufacturers will automate inside a building they already own, while still shipping. Hebe’s two conditions are worth copying into your own quote request: state the building limits (column grid, floor loading, clear height) and require a phased plan that keeps output running, with the vendor’s cutover steps written down. Ask, too, how the system copes when a shuttle or battery is down: Hebe’s system includes a manual battery swap station alongside the automatic one. Our RFQ guide shows where those requirements go, and the timeline here (go-live in early 2028) is a reminder that brownfield projects take time.

Source: Robotics & Automation News, October 26, 2026.