German equipment maker Jungheinrich has taken out top honours at the 2026 International Intralogistics and Forklift Truck of the Year Awards (IFOY), receiving the Integrated Customer Solutions award.

Other winners of the 2026 awards, held in Stuttgart recently, include Libiao Robotics, Nomagic, the Mobile Robot Company, Idealworks, Pyck and Wiltsche Fördersysteme.

This year a total of 49 products and solutions were entered into the competition, with 17 qualifying for the finals and undergoing the multi-stage IFOY Audit during Test Camp Intralogistics in April.

“Artificial intelligence is the defining technology of our time, and it was the dominant theme of this year’s IFOY Award competition,” says Anita Würmser, executive chairperson of the IFOY Jury. “During the audit process, the finalists demonstrated impressively what can already be achieved in real-world operations using AI. The final decision was a nail-biter, full of surprises, in an exceptionally strong field of competitors.”

The IFOY Awards is an independent organisation with the purpose of awarding the best intralogistics products and solutions of the year and developing activities to evaluate technical and strategic best performance in intralogistics and initiate innovation.

The awards are under the patronage of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy and are voted on by an international expert jury of industry journalists and logistics media representatives, evaluating products according to transparent criteria, independently and on the basis of professional expertise. 

Jungheinrich received the top honour for an AI-powered warehouse management solution developed for Liebherr’s new central spare parts distribution centre in Ehingen, Germany.

“The system orchestrates all warehouse and shipping processes on a single platform – from the high-bay pallet warehouse with 18,000 storage locations and the shuttle system for small parts with 40,000 tote locations to nine manual storage areas,” IFOY states. 

“Using self-learning algorithms, the solution determines the optimal timing for order picking and retrieval operations and dynamically adapts workflows to changing priorities and shipping windows. This ensures the reliable global supply of spare parts for cranes.”

IFOY states the jury had particular praise for the solution’s consistent use of AI to automate decision-making rather than individual process steps. 

“According to the jury, the project demonstrates impressively how data-driven control can increase the efficiency of complex logistics systems,” IFOY continues. 

“Its high forecasting accuracy, significant reduction in manual intervention, and proven operational improvements make it an outstanding example of intelligent intralogistics.”

The Industrial Truck of the Year title was awarded to Denmark’s The Mobile Robot Company for its J1600 self-driving pallet jack, with a 1.6T capacity which can be operated as a conventional pallet jack or can navigate autonomously through warehouse and production environments.

Special of the Year category was awarded to Wiltsche Fördersysteme for its Destuff-it, a mobile container-unloading system from Canada.

For the first time in the 14-year history of the awards, there was a tie with two winners presented in the same category after the jury could not decide between Libiao Robotics and Nomagic for the Robot Warehouse System award.

“Libiao Robotics impressed the jury with AirRob PRO, an innovative automation solution that combines robotics, conveying technology and storage into a single, easily deployable system,” IFOY states.

“Nomagic won over the jury with its Shoebox Picker, a groundbreaking robotics solution for the automated handling of shoeboxes in e-commerce operations.”

Start-up of the Year was awarded to German company Pyck for its Open-Source Toolkit for Warehousing Software, a toolkit which uses AI to model warehouse processes and automatically generate software from them.