An electronic device enclosure for retail shopping carts is disclosed having a cart mounting bracket attached to the side of a shopping cart near the front handle cross bar that does not interfere with the nesting of the cart as it was designed. An enclosure comprising a housing for an electronic device such as a tablet computer has a mounting bracket being incorporated into the rear of the housing and further having a mounting arm containing secured locking means to securely seat into the cart mounting bracket. The apparatus further contains means of transmitting via NFC to a CPU or to one of several networked CPU beacons docking confirmation and location data. The cart mount bracket is designed to withstand prolonged outdoor weather conditions without malfunctioning.

A cart has a wheeled base unit with a first frame portion on one side and a second frame portion on another. The frame portions are coupled by a frontend part. A handle unit connects the frame portions at a backside of the cart and also connects the base unit to a basket. An inner frame portion is between the frame portions and extends to the frontend part of the base unit. The inner frame portion includes a front contact portion and a stopper portion. A spacer portion is attached to the inner frame portion closer to the backside of the base unit than the stopper portion. The spacer portion is positioned to contact a front contact portion of another cart when carts are nested. A coupling portion is sandwiched between the inner frame portion and a frontend part of another cart when carts are nested.

The invention relates to a push handle unit of a shopping cart having at least one first and one second end piece, wherein a free-standing gripping unit which rises upward is arranged on at least one end piece, the gripping unit being designed as an object holder for receiving at least one beverage container and/or a scanner and/or a magnifier for enlarging text on a package and/or a handle cap and/or a smart phone.

Physical shopping carts can have product detection systems and associate physical shopping carts with mobile computing devices (e.g., smartphones, tablet computing devices, smart watches, wearable computing devices). For example, physical shopping carts can be equipped with one or more product detection systems (e.g., scanners, sensors, cameras) that can electronically tally products that are placed in physical shopping carts. Mobile computing devices can be associated with and mounted on the physical shopping carts to provide a variety of enhanced shopping cart features not possible with conventional physical shopping carts, such as electronically tracking the contents of a shopping cart, checking-out from the mobile computing device (instead of at conventional check-out areas, such as point of sale terminals), and others.

A shopping cart basket comprises one or more modular baskets couplable to a bottom basket having a plurality of wheels extending downwardly to allow the shopping cart basket to roll. Each of the modular baskets has a foldable bottom wall that can act as a bottom of a separate basket or can be folded against a side wall of the modular basket. The modular baskets could be used to hold items within a smaller compartment, and can be combined with the bottom basket to form a roll-able shopping cart having a larger compartment. Such a cart is advantageously used in a store, such as a grocery store, a retail shopping mall, or a home improvement store.

This disclosure is directed to an item-identifying, mobile cart that may be utilized by a user in a materials handling facility to automatically identify a user operating the cart and items that the user places into a basket of the cart. In addition, the cart may update a virtual shopping cart of the identified user to include items taken by the user. The mobile cart may include multiple imaging devices and oriented such that their respective optical axes are directed towards an interior of a perimeter of the top of the basket, and above the top of the basket. The mobile cart may also include an imaging device oriented away from the basket such that a user operating the mobile cart may scan a user identifier using this imaging device to enable recognition of the user.

A shopping cart and method of autonomous shopping are provided including a cart chassis, a scale configured to rest on base of the chassis, a basket resting on the scale, wherein weights of products placed in the basket are indicated by the output signal of the scale, a weight guard rail positioned above the product basket and attached to the cart chassis, a user identification unit, a payment module, and a motion sensor.

This disclosure is directed to an item-identifying cart that may be utilized by a user in a materials handling facility to automatically identify items that the user places in their cart, and update a virtual shopping cart to include items taken by the user. The mobile cart may include four capture assemblies that are disposed proximate to each of the four corners of a basket of the cart, and oriented such that their respective optical axes are directed towards an interior of a perimeter of the top of the basket, and above the top of the basket. The capture assemblies may include proximity sensors that are used to detect movement above the top of the basket, LEDs that illuminate items, and cameras that generate image data representing the items as they are placed in, or removed from, the cart.

Examples of systems and methods for locating movable objects such as carts (e.g., shopping carts) are disclosed. Such systems and methods can use dead reckoning techniques to estimate the current position of the movable object. Various techniques for improving accuracy of position estimates are disclosed, including compensation for various error sources involving the use of magnetometer and accelerometer, and using vibration analysis to derive wheel rotation rates. Various techniques utilize characteristics of the operating environment in conjunction with or in lieu of dead reckoning techniques, including characteristic of environment such as ground texture, availability of signals from radio frequency (RF) transmitters including precision fix sources. Navigation techniques can include navigation history and backtracking, motion direction detection for dual swivel casters, use of gyroscopes, determining cart weight, multi-level navigation, multi-level magnetic measurements, use of lighting signatures, use of multiple navigation systems, or hard/soft iron compensation for different cart configurations.

This disclosure is directed to an item-identifying cart that may be utilized by a user in a materials handling facility to automatically identify items that the user places in their cart, and update a virtual shopping cart to include items taken by the user. The mobile cart may include four capture assemblies that are disposed proximate to each of the four corners of a basket of the cart, and oriented such that their respective optical axes are directed towards an interior of a perimeter of the top of the basket, and above the top of the basket. The capture assemblies may include proximity sensors that are used to detect movement above the top of the basket, LEDs that illuminate items, and cameras that generate image data representing the items as they are placed in, or removed from, the cart.