Run the Fetch-Errand Test
Diligent Robotics builds Moxi as a hospital logistics robot aimed at the supply-fetching errands that repeatedly take clinical staff away from patients. That is a narrower and more defensible claim than general hospital automation.
The Bot Scout fetch-errand test measures the target before evaluating the robot: over one week, log how many times staff on a unit leave the floor to collect supplies, how far they walk, and how long each trip takes. That number is the ceiling on what any fetch robot can return, and it varies enormously between buildings.
A unit with a well-stocked supply room three metres away has almost no addressable errand time. A unit whose supplies live two floors down has a great deal. The robot is identical in both cases and the business case is not. The main alternative to compare against is Aethon's TUG, a larger cart-style transport robot that moves bulk supplies, linens, and medications rather than running individual fetch errands.
| Question | Why it matters | How to measure | Signal it will not pay off |
|---|---|---|---|
| How many fetch trips per shift? | Sets the addressable work | Log trips for one week | Fewer than a handful per shift |
| How far is the supply route? | Determines time returned | Walk and time the route | Supply room adjacent to the unit |
| Who receives the delivery? | Handoff decides real saving | Observe a live handoff | Nurse must stop mid-task anyway |
| What crosses locked doors? | Access integration cost | Map badge points | Every route needs a badge |
| What happens at peak? | Value concentrates at peak | Observe at shift change | Robot avoids peak corridors |
What to Verify Before a Pilot
Elevator integration, badge access, and network coverage are the practical gating items, and they are the hospital's cost rather than the vendor's. Confirm who pays for and schedules that work before agreeing a pilot date.
Measure delivery latency and staff walking time before and during the pilot. Deliveries completed is a vanity metric; walking time returned to patient care is the one that justifies the system — the same handoff discipline used in the hospital robots guide.
Moxi is facility equipment rather than a regulated medical device, since it does not act on a patient. That classification decides the buying process, as set out in the medical robot definition guide.
- Log fetch trips per shift for a week before evaluating any robot.
- Time the supply route on foot to establish the addressable saving.
- Confirm who funds elevator and badge integration.
- Measure staff walking time, not deliveries completed.
- Observe a live handoff to confirm the saving is real.
Where It Fits Against Alternatives
The honest competitor is not another robot. It is restocking the unit more often, relocating the supply room, or changing the par-level policy, and any of those can beat a robot in a building where the route is short.
Where the route is genuinely long and crosses floors, a fetch robot is a reasonable answer and the alternatives are expensive. Compare against the broader transport category in the medical delivery robots guide.
Moxi 2.0: What Changed After Five Years of Field Data
Diligent has run Moxi in hospitals for five years now, and the second-generation unit is built from what that deployment history actually showed rather than from a spec-sheet redesign. Longer operating hours between charging cycles and faster per-delivery time are the two changes Diligent points to first, both aimed directly at the addressable-errand math the fetch-errand test above already asks a hospital to run.
The bigger shift is behind the robot, not on it. Diligent describes an internal data flywheel: every delivery, badge tap, and elevator wait across five years of live hospital runs feeds back into routing and task-sequencing decisions for the fleet, rather than each unit learning only from its own building. A hospital piloting Moxi 2.0 is buying into a system tuned on a much larger delivery history than a first-generation pilot ever ran against.
Whether the second-generation chassis still shares its mobile base with a third-party platform, or moves to hardware Diligent controls end to end, is worth asking the vendor directly during a demo. That answer affects parts lead time and long-term service cost more than any single spec on a comparison sheet, and it is exactly the kind of question the badge-access and elevator-integration checklist above should be extended to cover for a 2.0 pilot.
Bottom Line
Moxi targets nursing fetch errands, so its value is set by how much of that work your building actually generates. Measure the errands first, then judge the robot — and for a Moxi 2.0 pilot specifically, ask what changed in the mobile base as well as the software.
Log fetch trips and route length on one unit for a week before booking a vendor pilot.
FAQs
What does the Moxi robot do?
Diligent Robotics builds Moxi as a hospital logistics robot targeting supply-fetching errands that take clinical staff away from patient care.
Is Moxi a medical device?
No. It moves supplies rather than acting on a patient, so it is treated as facility equipment and bought through operations rather than a clinical service line.
How do you know if a fetch robot will pay off?
Log how many times staff leave the floor for supplies in a week and how long each trip takes. That total is the ceiling on what any fetch robot can return.
What are the alternatives to a hospital fetch robot?
Restocking the unit more frequently, relocating the supply room, or changing par-level policy. In buildings with short supply routes those usually win.
What's new in Moxi 2.0?
Longer operating hours between charges, faster per-delivery time, and routing decisions trained on five years of fleet-wide delivery data rather than a single building's history. Ask the vendor directly whether the mobile base changed, since that affects service cost.