How Calmantech Goals to Beat Low-cost Robots with Smarter Design

Within the high-stakes world of logistics, house is cash—and mobility is every thing. Conventional warehouse robots usually wrestle in tight areas, slowing down operations or forcing pricey redesigns. Calmantech, a Korean robotics firm, thinks it has a greater manner ahead. At CES 2026, it can promote its Ball Whell Expertise as used within the CMB-90: a compact, omnidirectional warehouse robotic constructed for the subsequent technology of high-efficiency distribution facilities.

The issue Calmantech got down to resolve is obvious: warehouses are getting extra crowded, and the demand for quicker throughput retains rising. Most legacy robots depend on fastened paths or broad turning circles, which doesn’t work properly within the slender corridors and compact layouts of some achievement facilities. People can pivot and switch inside a three-foot-wide aisle—why not robots?

Sadly, there’s a extreme scarcity of (human) labor in lots of elements of the world, together with South Korea, and the necessity for robots has by no means been better in some areas.

Enter the CMB-90 (picture above). This robotic stands out due to its “Ball Wheel Expertise,” which is analogous in idea to the ball mechanism utilized in old-school pc mice with an precise ball inside. Reasonably than rolling on fastened wheels, the CMB-90 glides throughout flooring utilizing friction-based ball wheels that permit for motion in any path—ahead, sideways, or a spin in place. This makes the robotic particularly nimble in confined areas, slicing down journey time and growing the quantity of usable warehouse flooring.

The innovation doesn’t cease at motion. The CMB-90 helps a payload of as much as 90 kilograms. Whereas it might transfer in any path, the robotic is optimized for ahead movement, assisted by a strong imaginative and prescient system: a two RGB digital camera module within the entrance, and extra cameras within the again, left, and proper. This setup offers it a large area of view for impediment avoidance and spatial consciousness, even in dynamic environments.

Like many fashionable warehouse robots, the CMB-90 communicates by means of a mesh Wi-Fi community, transmitting information constantly for real-time fleet administration. Nonetheless, Calmantech understands that the majority amenities can’t merely change their previous infrastructure in a single day. That’s why the CMB-90 is constructed to co-exist with legacy robots, making it simpler for firms to improve steadily as a substitute of committing to a full system substitute.

Calmantech CEO, Jaehwan Choi (left)

A pure query is whether or not Calmantech’s ball-based mobility may be vulnerable to mud or particles. The corporate acknowledges that, like all friction-based system, cleanliness issues—however says the advantages far outweigh the trade-offs, particularly in new amenities designed with robotics in thoughts. The corporate says its Ball-Wheel may face up to industrial circumstances.

The enterprise problem is stiff. Calmantech is getting into a world market the place Chinese language-made robots dominate on worth. However the firm is betting that velocity, effectivity, and versatile deployment will win out in the long term, particularly in Europe and the U.S. Their technique focuses on new build-outs first, the place warehouses could be designed from the bottom as much as reap the benefits of CMB-90’s compact footprint and superior agility.

The design lands itself to many adaptation, and Calmantech made certain this platform is customizable and lots of several types of robots could be constructed based mostly on the wheel platform.

Based in Korea, Calmantech is not any stranger to tough environments. Its early work focused ageing industrial zones with declining populations and poor working circumstances. That historical past has formed its mission: to create robots that may do extra with much less—much less house, much less time, and finally, much less value.

With the CMB-90, Calmantech isn’t simply making one other warehouse robotic. It’s providing a better, extra agile coworker that matches into the fashionable logistics puzzle with out asking the entire system to vary. And that may be precisely what the business wants.

Filed in Robots. Learn extra about CES, Korea and Robotics.