NEO ASRS. Better than AutoStore.Goods-to-person, decoupled.

NEO ASRS is the closest direct alternative for operations that need SKU flexibility and predictable retrieval rather than maximum storage density. The architectural difference is the whole argument: AutoStore stacks bins in a cube and works from the top, so reaching a lower bin means relocating the bins above it — AutoStore’s own FAQ puts retrieval from the sixteenth level at 3 minutes 36 seconds. NEO uses open aisles, so any robot reaches any bin at any station with no depth penalty at all. NEO also carries 40 kg per bin against the 30 kg AutoStore publishes, and goes to 12 m of height where AutoStore bins stack to 5.8 to 6 m. Where AutoStore leads: installed base, around 2,000 systems in 68 countries, and raw port throughput.

750+ picks per hour and 180+ bins presented per hour, per goods-to-person station, with 2.5 times the cubic volume per bin presentation. Falcon puts AutoStore at 500 to 600 and Exotec at 600 picks per hour per station. Because the architecture is decoupled, that rate scales linearly as you add robots rather than degrading with congestion the way grid systems do at density. In practice operators move from 70 to 100 pieces per person per hour manually to 700 to 800 with NEO — a four to five times productivity gain and up to a 75 percent reduction in the people needed on the pick.

No. NEO deploys inside your existing warehouse envelope with no floor grinding, levelling or laser alignment. That is one of the main reasons implementation runs 4 to 8 weeks against 12 to 16+ weeks for cube systems that require precise floor tolerances before the grid can be built.

40 kg, about 88 lb, per bin, against 30 kg for AutoStore and 30 to 35 kg for Exotec. That extra payload is what opens ASRS automation to tools, automotive parts, small appliances, hard goods and dense consumables that lighter cube systems have to exclude. Bins are configurable into 2, 3, 4, 6 or 8 compartments.

Up to 12 m of system height, roughly 39 ft, with about 1.5 m of clear height needed above that for the structure. AutoStore publishes a grid in which bins stack to 5.8 to 6 m, so in a tall building NEO roughly doubles the cube you get from the same floor plate. Exotec, the other climbing system, publishes up to 14 m — higher than NEO. We would rather you knew that from us than from them.

Three things, and they are real. Installed base: roughly 2,000 systems across 68 countries as of their Q2 2026 results, with a mature certified-integrator network behind them. Raw port throughput: AutoStore publishes 400 bins per hour at floor level and 500 on a mezzanine, higher than the per-station figure we quote for NEO. And storage density, which is what cube geometry is for. If your SKUs are small and stable and density in an expensive footprint is the metric that decides it, AutoStore built that category. We will tell you so on the call rather than sell you the wrong system.

Typically 4 to 8 weeks from order to running, compared with 12 to 16+ weeks for cube ASRS. The system is modular, so you add rack, robots and bins incrementally afterwards without redesigning the installation or taking the operation down.