[#289] Supply Chain in Numbers - June 9, 2025

DHL buys 1k stretch robots, Shein leases 15 hectares of warehouse in Vietnam, Clarium raised $27M, Amazon's new 3.1M sqft FC in Virginia, Toyota Automated Logistics' $34B 'going private' valuation

Welcome to “Supply Chain in Numbers.” This newsletter tracks significant numbers from the supply chain world. Five prominent numbers are published every Monday. If you have any feedback, please send it to me.

1,000 ‘Stretch’ robots

Global logistics provider DHL Group plans to buy more than 1,000 automated container-unloading robots from Massachusetts tech firm Boston Dynamics, saying it expects to expand the range of future applications for the “Stretch” robots to include additional use cases such as case picking. The new units would follow after DHL Supply Chain, DHL Group’s contract logistics division, introduced Stretch commercially to its operations in North America in 2023 and more recently to the United Kingdom and across Europe. Stretch robots have achieved case unloading rates of up to 700 cases per hour and contributed to higher employee satisfaction by reducing the need for physically demanding work in hot or cold trailers. [DC Velocity]

15 hectares of warehouse space

Shein has leased nearly 15 hectares of warehouse space near Ho Chi Minh City, its first major facility in Vietnam, as it looks to reduce reliance on China amid ongoing US-China trade tensions. The move is part of a broader diversification strategy that includes sourcing from countries like Turkey and Brazil, as well as responding to rising tariffs on Chinese goods. While Shein continues investing heavily in its China-based supply chain, including a $500M hub near Guangzhou, the growing threat to the US “de minimis” exemption is pushing the company to rethink fulfillment routes. This regulatory gap gives Vietnam-based operations like Shein’s new warehouse a key cost advantage, especially for low-value e-commerce exports to American consumers. [Reuters]

$27 million Series A funding

Clarium, the company powering the world’s first and market-leading AI-powered healthcare supply chain resiliency platform, announced a $27 million Series A funding round. This round brings Clarium’s total funding to $43 million to-date, and will allow the company to deliver on its mission of optimizing the modern health system and mitigating growing economic and environmental uncertainty in the supply chain for suppliers and hospitals. Clarium’s platform collects, unifies, and automates crowdsourced data from providers, suppliers, and vendors across the entire healthcare supply chain. The resiliency platform — which spans workflow operations, inventory and stock management, and disruption and substitution optimization — are ideated and built in collaboration with leading health systems, allowing Clarium to respond swiftly and directly to the needs of supply chain teams. After adopting Astra OS, hospital systems have seen reduction in average cost savings, fueled by faster disruption resolution and 88% substitute approvals. [PR Newswire]

3.1 million sqft FC

Amazon has begun construction of a robotics fulfillment center in Goochland County, Virginia. The 3.1-million-square-foot facility will pick, pack and ship smaller items like books and toys and is expected to be fully operational in 2027. The Goochland County site will be the fourth such facility in the state for the e-commerce giant, which has invested more than $135 billion in Virginia since 2010. The company currently operates two robotics facility centers in the state, with another in Virginia Beach expected to open this year. In addition, Amazon announced in March it is building a robotics fulfillment center in North Carolina to add to a roster that also includes robotic-enabled facilities in Louisiana and Texas. The company has around 100 such sites across the U.S. [Supply Chain Dive]

$34 billion valuation

The nearly century-old founding company of the Toyota business empire plans to go private in a deal that values the maker of forklifts, auto parts and logistics software at about $34 billion. Established in 1926 by Sakichi Toyoda to make automatic looms, Toyota Industries is a key supplier to Toyota Motor, which was spun off in 1937. Toyota Industries plans to advance development of autonomous technologies for forklifts and logistics-management software through the privatization. About a year ago, the company launched Toyota Automated Logistics to house its logistics and forklift business, along with firms it had acquired. These include supply-chain integration firm Bastian Solutions, Dutch logistics process-automation company Vanderlande and Germany’s viastore, which sells materials-handling systems and warehouse-management software. [WSJ]