DCS’ Bob Hosier Weighs in on STIQ’s 2026 Sortation Equipment Report

STIQ Ltd.’s newly released Sortation Equipment 2026 market report pulls together input from dozens of integrators, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and component suppliers across the global sortation market. Bob Hosier, Vice President of Supply Chain Solutions at DCS (pictured at right), was among the contributors. Hosier offered perspective on tariffs, labor costs, last-mile automation, and how far sortation technology has come.

Tariffs Have Become the Cost of Doing Business

Asked how the industry has responded to tariff-driven, geopolitical uncertainty, Hosier said the market has largely absorbed it rather than stalled over it. He noted, “The market has started to adapt to tariff uncertainty and absorb it into the process… for a lot of companies it’s the cost of doing business now, and it is reflected in pricing.”

He also pointed to a related shift in manufacturing strategy, adding that OEMs are increasingly localizing production to manage that same uncertainty.

“A lot of OEMs now are putting up sites in the US. They’re doing final manufacturing or final assembly in the US due to concerns about geopolitical unrest and delivery lead times. And that starts to ease the mind of customers,” he said.

Regional DCs and the Shrinking ROI Timeline

On the growth of smaller, regionalized distribution centers, Hosier connected the trend directly to labor economics.  “You’re starting to see more regionalized distribution centers being automated. In the past mid-sized 3PLs have always been challenged with automation. But costs are going up, labor is rising, and everything else means the ROI payback period is dropping,” he explained.

Hosier made a similar point elsewhere in the report, tying rising operating costs directly to the automation business case. “With the cost of labor going up, the cost of fuel going up, and all those other tangentials, regional DC automation starts to make sense,” he added.

Parcel and Fast Fashion Driving Growth

Hosier pointed to DCS’s own project pipeline as evidence of concentrated demand in certain markets.

“We’ve had some great growth in parcel and final mile automation systems and market penetrations in fast fashion e-commerce distribution,” he reported.

Technology Has Caught Up to Harder Problems

Hosier also spoke to how far sortation hardware has advanced. He shared that equipment can now handle items that once required manual workarounds.

“There’s a lot more sortation technologies out there than a traditional sliding shoe sorter or a multi-band narrow belt sorter,” he explained. “If you look at cross belt sorters or push tray sorters, we can also do bigger sortation trays now so we can sort what was traditionally non-conveyable things now the technology has caught up.”

Hosier also returned to that broader theme twice in the report. He summed up the shift in both technology and choice available to customers this way: “Sortation solutions have evolved significantly over the last several years both in technology features and supplier options. This has offered a broader set of customers.”

Quotes and data referenced from STIQ Ltd’s “Sortation Equipment, 2026” report.
Source: STIQ Ltd, 2026 Sortation Equipment Market Report.