Since 2009, Breathe Technologies has been a long-term partner to retail and e-commerce fulfilment operations. As a technology-agnostic systems integrator, we bring together robotics, sorters, packing automation and more, then use BreatheIQ software, our AI optimisation layer, to make them work as one, delivering faster, measurable ROI with less operational risk.
Philip Rowlands, Software Development Director at Breathe Technologies speaks to Warehouse & Logistics News.
What are your best-known products/solutions/services?
We’re best known as a technology-agnostic systems integrator, connecting physical automation with our customers’ host systems so everything runs as one operation. That integration expertise is backed by BreatheIQ, our AI optimisation software layer. Together, they mean we can design specific solutions around each customer’s needs, and scale them as the business grows.
Which industry sectors are your customers in and which ones are growing fastest?
Our heritage is in retail and e-commerce, across sectors including fashion, beauty and toiletries, animal medicines, household appliances, books, and tools and hardware. Many of these customers have been with us for years. We also work with major 3PLs.
What are your most recent products and innovations?
The biggest shift for us over the past year has been on the software side. BreatheIQ, our AI optimisation layer, is built on a strong automation foundation, with WES, WCS and packing modules. We’ve now extended the platform with new modules that take optimisation across the full stock lifecycle.
The first, Pick IQ, is already proven at several sites. It uses clustering, batching and pick-walk optimisation to reduce travel and increase throughput. The second, Stock IQ, our new inventory product, is going live as part of a full system from goods-in to despatch.
Alongside this, we’ve continued our move into robotics, including Libiao robotic sortation for Specsavers.
For our customers, it means we offer a holistic approach to warehouse orchestration rather than improving one process in isolation.
What are the major trends and developments affecting your category and your customers, and how are you responding?
There are three things that stand out. Firstly, modular automation is becoming the norm. Operations leaders need to phase investment, scale with demand and keep their options open, rather than committing to a single automation system for the next decade.
Secondly, software is where the competitive advantage sits. Automation hardware is maturing fast, so the difference comes from how intelligently it’s orchestrated and how much insight the operation gets back from it. Thirdly, what customers value has changed. Throughput still matters, but conversations focus on labour, traceability, margin protection and, increasingly, resilience. Resilience has to be designed in from the start, through how systems are integrated, where the dependencies sit and how quickly operations can recover. And customers increasingly expect to prove all of this with data.
Our response is to be the partner that brings those threads together: the right technology, software that optimises it as one system, and the commercial thinking to make a long-term plan achievable.
Can you tell us about any recent customer contracts and how you helped the customer meet their challenges?
A good recent example is Mountain Warehouse’s 458,000 sq ft distribution centre in Peterborough, which serves retail stores and e-commerce customers. Manual picking relied heavily on seasonal labour, with limited room to add headcount or space. The product range added complexity as bulky winter lines like coats and boots pick and pack very differently from the summer range.
We deployed Pick IQ, which plugged into the site’s existing WMS. It provided volumetric profiling for the seasonal range alongside order batching and route optimisation with no change to how pickers work. Pick IQ delivered a 15% uplift in picking performance from the same team with no upfront cost on a monthly subscription.
Can you tell us about any areas where you’re currently making technical advances e.g., safety, sustainability, environment?
Sustainability is an area where we have measurable impact.
On sustainability, the biggest gains come from shipping less packaging and less empty space. Pack IQ, our BreatheIQ volumetrics module, uses product and order dimensions to select the right-sized carton for every order which results in less packaging, void fill and wasted transport space. Another example is at Specsavers, with the Libiao combined T-sort and 3D sort robotic sortation system that we recently delivered cutting packaging waste by up to 50%.
Are you investing in staff training and skills development?
We always do, across all areas using a combination of internal mentoring and external support, from apprenticeships to manager and leadership development. Being based at SciTech Daresbury provides us with regular training and awareness programmes.
Breathe Technologies
t: 01925 742888
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