Industry Technologies
The German Otto Group, a trading and services company with retail as its core business, based in Hamburg, and Nvidia Corporation, headquartered in Santa Clara, California (aka Silicon Valley), one of the world's largest developers of graphics processors, announced their cooperation. The aim of the collaboration is to improve intralogistics processes and supply chain operations through intelligent robotics.
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The ‘Endeavor Building’ at Santa Clara, California, aka Silicon Valley – the Nvidia Corporation headquarters.
Otto Group expects to gain significant competitive advantages from its collaboration with the tech giant. As reported by the Hamburg headquarters, the project planning represents a comprehensive approach to train robots in a simulation environment for intelligent robotic automation, setting a new industry benchmark for improved efficiency of logistics operations, scalability, and integration.
Setting a new industry benchmark
To this end, the Hermes Fulfilment logistics center in Loehne, Germany, is foreseen to serve as the first full-scale operational site and blueprint for further roll-outs. According to explanations given to the press, following this, Otto Group One.O will develop the layer's core, including its integration interfaces, and will assume governance of the solution.
Implementation of physics-based digital twins
The executive partner in the alliance to implement Otto Group’s trailblazing tech application with Reply spa is of European origin. The Turin-based Italian IT service provider—with its network of global subsidiaries—specializes in developing and implementing processes leveraging new communication channels and digital media across numerous projects.
By creating physics-based digital twins of Otto Group's existing distribution and fulfillment centers, the “magic” shall become reality: to simulate, train, and deploy different kinds of robots, including autonomous mobile and stationary robots, significantly faster, and to enable seamless collaboration among robots across logistics operations.
Creating a digital twin is more than just mapping a space – it’s about enabling intelligent orchestration at scale,” emphasizes Kai Uwe Ernst from Reply Germany. It’s the combination of Nvidia’s AI infrastructure, Nvidia Omniverse libraries, and Nvidia Isaac for AI Robotics, along with Reply’s indeed impressive implementation expertise, that provides the potential to create the targeted foundational infrastructure to begin with. The overall goal is to fully digitize and optimize supply chain operations, and it is adaptable to changing needs in scale, peak management, and overall efficiency.
To get there, a "Robotic Coordination Layer" shall connect robot fleets in the real warehouse to a digital twin – an exact virtual representation of the logistics centers. This digital twin will display the real-time locations and movements of all robots, using reality-capture techniques and advanced post-processing of sensor and camera data. Enabling seamless, interactive control and management of operations - once established, the digital twin shall enable virtual reconfiguration of warehouse areas for process optimization and dynamic simulations.
About Otto Group: Ranked second in the world as an online retailer
As early as summer 2012, Michael Otto predicted with great certainty that there would probably be only two large online retailers with universal offerings in the future: Amazon and Otto.
The family-owned Otto GmbH & Co. KGaA (a German partnership limited by shares, with a limited-liability company serving as the general partner) was able to stabilize its sales in the 2024/25 fiscal year at the previous year's level and generate sales revenues of around €15 billion [~17,5 bn US$]. This was achieved “despite the tense geopolitical situation and continued subdued consumer sentiment in key sales markets for all market participants, including the Otto Group,” according to the annual report. The company employs around 36,300 people worldwide.
Leadership: from the beginning into the future
It was Michael Otto’s father, Werner Otto, who founded “Otto Versandhandel” (Otto Mail-Order Business) in 1949: The company had three employees. The first Otto mail-order catalog was published in 1950 with 14 printed pages and a print run of 300 copies. In less than two years, Otto quintupled its sales. The catalog’s print run rose to 37,000 copies… reaching millions by the 1990s.
Michael Otto, the founder’s son, joined the family business in 1971, where he assumed responsibility for textile purchasing as a member of the Executive Board. From that point on, he established a new organizational structure. Ten years later, he took over as CEO. In his role as Chairman of the Executive Board from 1981 to 2007, he transformed the company into a digital retail and services group with a digital vision. The path to the top of the global fashion mail-order industry is paved with smart, strategic, pioneering decisions. As early as 1995, the slogan “Otto goes online” was adopted, and the company established a strong online presence at otto.de with a wide range of products.
Entry into the U.S. Market
In 1998, the Otto Group acquired a stake in the Chicago-based home furnishings retailer Crate & Barrel, marking the start of its operations in the U.S. market. By the turn of the millennium, the family-owned company had become the world’s second-largest online retailer, behind Amazon.
Strong Commitment to Sustainability
As early as 1993, the Michael Otto Foundation for Environmental Protection was established. This was followed in 2005 by the founding of the Aid by Trade Foundation. Its goal is to preserve the livelihoods of people in the countries where it operates.
Prof. Dr. Michael Otto himself, as a private individual, is a member of the “Club of Rome” and supports the alliance for sustainably produced African cotton, “Cotton Made in Africa.” In 2008, the Otto Group committed to halving its CO2 emissions by 2020. It has kept its word on this as well.
Change of the guard at Otto Group — Effective March 1, 2026, Benjamin Otto, third-generation scion of the family dynasty, took the helm. As successor to his father, Prof. Dr. Michael Otto, he became chairman of the foundation and shareholders' council of the Otto Group, thereby assuming control of the international trading and services group.
On April 1, Dr. Philipp Andrée joined the Otto Group Executive Board. The former Chief Commercial Officer of the Douglas Group, the number-one omnichannel premium beauty destination in Europe with a total of ~1,850 stores, available both online and offline, succeeds Sergio Bucher, who now serves on the Otto Group Supervisory Board.
Dr. Andrée oversees the sourcing activities of Otto International and will assume the chairmanship of the advisory boards for the Crate & Barrel, Manufactum, Frankonia, and Freemans & Grattan businesses of the group. Andrée is regarded as an industry expert with international experience in digitalization, marketing, and strategic business development in the e-commerce and omnichannel sectors.
Dr. Andrée has also been responsible for the Brands and Retail division on the Executive Board since April 1st. © Otto Group.
Dr. Andrée oversees the sourcing activities of Otto International and will assume the chairmanship of the advisory boards for the Crate & Barrel, Manufactum, Frankonia, and Freemans & Grattan businesses of the group. Andrée is regarded as an industry expert with international experience in digitalization, marketing, and strategic business development in the e-commerce and omnichannel sectors.
Dr. Andrée has also been responsible for the Brands and Retail division on the Executive Board since April 1st. © Otto Group.
About Nvidia: Pushing robotics aggressively
Nvidia Corporation is a U.S. company and one of the largest developers of graphics processors. It is a global technology giant that develops graphics processing units (GPUs) for AI, gaming, and data centers. Their offerings cover chipsets for personal computers, servers, and game consoles.
Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, the company held over 80% market share in the discrete desktop graphics card market in the second quarter of 2022. Nvidia does not have its own manufacturing facilities and therefore operates according to the “fabless principle” [derived from English fabrication less = factory-free or without manufacturing, a business model that has spread since at least the 1990s in the context of globalization, the digital revolution, outsourcing, and offshoring, and is used in the global economy. [Source: Wikipedia].
Nvidia’s recent strategy to get into physical applications – like with the Otto collaboration - is not out of idealism, but out of strategic necessity. Its most important market, the GPU market, will eventually be commoditized. In cloud AI, hyperscalers such as AWS, Google (TPU), Amazon (Trainium), and Meta are developing their own AI accelerators, which often substitute or complement Nvidia in cloud infrastructures.
Physical lock-ins, hence robotic applications, are paving the way – with strong support from Europe – for the current global market leader. Another example: Mercedes-Benz just announced it will work with the Nvidia Corporation for autonomous driving. This, while Stuttgart will skip its very own platform development in that respect. Robot taxis with the star to be launched in Abu Dhabi in the foreseeable future. Whoever controls robot intelligence will control manufacturing in the future, including the textile, apparel, and fashion sectors.
The company name, undoubtedly one of the most valuable in the world and having seen a meteoric rise in the stock market, is derived from the Latin word invidia, meaning "envy".
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Since 2023, Otto Group has been among the industry leaders leveraging case handling robot Stretch® in more than 20 facilities and its quadruped robot Spot® in more than 10 in 2026. © Boston Dynamics
For more than three decades, Prof. Dr. Michael Otto had been the honorary chairman of the Otto Group's supervisory board and chairman of the board of trustees of the Michael Otto Foundation. Our photo shows the entrepreneur over exchange with former U.S. President Barack Obama.© Private archive, July 2018
As part of the transition to a new generation, Petra Scharner-Wolff was appointed Chairwoman of the Executive Board in the spring of last year, becoming the driving force at the helm of the global business. Photo: Viktor Schanz for Otto Group