Issue Multivendor robot fleets with proprietary protocols create an interoperability hazard

Summary

Deloitte expects organisations to operate increasingly mixed fleets as physical AI matures, combining robots, autonomous vehicles and AI agents supplied by different vendors. Each vendor tends to use its own proprietary protocols. That lack of common ground creates interoperability problems with concrete consequences, including accidents, downtime, congestion and inefficiency in operations. The report treats orchestration of these fleets as one of the barriers that must be solved before physical AI can scale. It suggests autonomous fleet management and orchestration systems as a way to resolve these conflicts. A humanoid developer interviewed in the chapter likewise stresses that fleet software must cope with field conditions such as bandwidth limits before robots can be deployed in the thousands.