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Otto Group and robotics firm Sereact plan to test up to 25 AI-controlled robots sorting returned goods at a logistics centre in Poland. The trial will start with ten dual-arm systems, with another 15 planned if the first phase goes well, testing whether AI can handle the unpredictable items that make returns difficult to automate.

What happened Sereact says its Cortex model will recognise and handle items it has not encountered before, without a fixed product catalogue or product-specific teaching. The robots are intended to grasp returned goods, assess their condition and sort them. The partners describe a two-phase project, with a broader rollout across Otto Group’s logistics network only a possibility if the second phase succeeds. Sereact says it trains and validates Cortex using NVIDIA’s Isaac Sim, Isaac Lab and Cosmos tools. It says lessons from the returns line can be turned into tested updates within days. The companies describe the announcement as a project to assess reliability, flexibility and quality in real operations, not a completed network-wide deployment.

Discuss: Should warehouse AI take on this kind of messy work, or should human judgement remain central to sorting returns?

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