The short answer
A UAE mall can put robots to work in four places: scrubbing atriums, concourses and retail aisles overnight (the Gausium Scrubber 75P, from about $95,880, or the Avidbots Neo 2, from about $72,000, for large floors; the Scrubber 50, from about $34,500, for aisles), sweeping semi-outdoor entrances and car-park levels (the Pudu MT1, from about $46,000), helping shoppers find their way (the LG CLOi GuideBot, from about $39,990, which speaks Arabic, or the compact KettyBot, from about $8,900, for greeting and mobile signage) and patrolling after closing (an indoor patrol robot from about $52,000). These are HORMĒ's indicative prices in US dollars before VAT, installation and integration. Running each machine under the HORMĒ behavior platform adds a licence from $149 per machine per month, and most operators start with a paid 90-day pilot on one zone or one level.
Why floor area decides the robot plan in a mall
In a mall, floor area is the driver. Atriums, concourses, food courts and service corridors add up to very large hard floors that have to be clean before doors open, and the cleaning window is the few hours between closing and the first deliveries. HORMĒ's working estimate is that a super-regional centre needs six to eight large autonomous scrubbers before its overnight cleaning windows are covered; the right number for a given building depends on its floor plan, finishes and opening hours, which is what a site survey and a pilot establish.
Footfall is the other pressure. The largest UAE malls handle very heavy traffic: Emaar reported that Dubai Mall recorded 111 million visitors in 2024, about 6% more than in 2023. Busy floors need cleaning during the day as well as at night, shoppers need directions in many languages, and car parks and service areas still need watching after the shops close.
Robots also fit Dubai's stated plans. The Dubai Robotics and Automation Program, launched in September 2022, aims to raise the sector's contribution to Dubai's economy to 9% within ten years and lists consumer services and tourism among its focus areas.
Four jobs robots do in a mall
1. Atriums, concourses and retail aisles
Overnight scrubbing of large hard floors is the job with the clearest case. The Gausium Scrubber 75P is an industrial scrubber-dryer built for airports, malls and large terminals; it is rated at about 3,000 m² an hour and its docking station fills and drains water automatically, removing the manual water stop. The Avidbots Neo 2 is a large-format scrubber rated at about 3,900 m² an hour. For narrower retail aisles, corridors and food-court surrounds, the mid-size Scrubber 50 (about 1,800 m² an hour, 3D LiDAR) or the 20-inch Tennant X4 ROVR are easier to manoeuvre between fixtures. As rough arithmetic only: a machine running at its rated 3,000 m² an hour through a six-hour night shift would cover up to 18,000 m²; real coverage is lower once turns, obstacles, water changes and charging are counted. For every floor-care machine HORMĒ lists, see commercial cleaning robots in the UAE.
2. Entrances, drop-off areas and car parks
Sand and dust blow in through every entrance, taxi rank and car-park ramp. Indoor scrubbers are not built for that; the Pudu MT1 is a semi-outdoor sweeper for dust, sand and large debris, with 3D perception, rated for areas of up to 100,000 m² and designed to run around the clock.
3. Wayfinding, greeting and promotions
Shoppers ask the same questions all day: where is a particular store, which car-park level, where is the prayer room or the nearest exit. A guide robot such as the LG CLOi GuideBot answers on a dual touchscreen and by voice in several languages, including Arabic, runs for about 10 hours and can walk a visitor to the destination. The smaller Pudu KettyBot, with an 18.5-inch screen, greets visitors, shows promotions as mobile signage and records footfall analytics, which suits entrances, event spaces and tenant activations. Food-court and restaurant tenants can add tray robots such as the BellaBot; see delivery and service robots in the UAE.
4. Patrol after closing
Once the shops close, an indoor patrol robot can walk concourses, service corridors and car-park levels on a set route, riding the lifts between floors. The patrol robot in HORMĒ's catalogue uses thermal and visual sensors and routes anything unusual to a human operator to verify before an alert reaches the security team. For open-air car parks and perimeters, the Ascento Guard, a two-wheeled outdoor patrol robot proven on sites of 40,000 m², is the outdoor option. See security and patrol robots in the UAE.
Machines HORMĒ lists for malls and retail
| Job | Machine | Maker | Indicative price | Lead time | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atriums and concourses | Scrubber 75P | Gausium (CN) | From $95,880 | 12–16 weeks | Industrial scrubber-dryer for malls and large terminals; 3,000 m²/hr, auto fill and drain docking |
| Very large floors | Neo 2 | Avidbots (CA) | From $72,000 | 14–20 weeks | Large-format autonomous scrubber; 3,900 m²/hr, LiDAR and vision navigation |
| Retail aisles and corridors | Scrubber 50 | Gausium (CN) | From $34,500 | 10–14 weeks | Mid-size scrubber for aisles and corridors; 1,800 m²/hr, 3D LiDAR, 4–6 hours |
| Tight aisles | X4 ROVR | Tennant (US) | From $38,500 | 14–18 weeks | 20-inch compact scrubber agile enough for retail aisles; BrainOS navigation, 2.5 hours |
| Entrances and car parks | MT1 outdoor sweeper | Pudu Robotics (CN) | From $46,000 | 12–16 weeks | Semi-outdoor sweeping of dust, sand and large debris; up to 100,000 m², 24/7 |
| Wayfinding | CLOi GuideBot | LG Electronics (KR) | From $39,990 | 12–16 weeks | Multilingual wayfinding, including Arabic; dual touchscreen, 10 hours |
| Greeting and promotions | KettyBot | Pudu Robotics (CN) | From $8,900 | 8–12 weeks | Greeting, guidance and mobile signage with footfall analytics; 18.5 in screen, 12 hours |
| Indoor patrol | Indoor patrol robot | Cobalt Robotics (US) | From $52,000 | 14–18 weeks | Multi-floor patrol that rides the lift, with thermal and visual sensors and human verification of alerts |
| Outdoor car parks | Ascento Guard | Ascento (CH) | From $78,000 | 16–22 weeks | All-weather two-wheeled outdoor patrol robot; handles kerbs, proven on 40,000 m² sites |
Indicative list prices in US dollars, excluding VAT, installation and integration, subject to confirmation. Treat them as budgetary ceilings: volume orders price below these figures. For prices side by side, see how much a commercial cleaning robot costs in the UAE and how much a security robot costs in the UAE.
An illustrative starter fleet
A common first step is one machine for each of the three jobs shoppers notice most. Using the list prices above, one Scrubber 75P for the main concourse ($95,880), one CLOi GuideBot at the busiest entrance ($39,990) and one KettyBot for greeting and promotions ($8,900) come to about $144,770 in hardware, before VAT, installation and integration. Under the HORMĒ Core licence, intended for service and cleaning machines on known routes, the three machines add $447 a month ($149 each). Adding an indoor patrol robot ($52,000) brings the hardware to about $196,770; security machines normally run on the Autonomy licence at $349 a month, taking the monthly total to $796. This is an arithmetic example from list prices, not a quotation; a site survey fixes the real numbers.
Leasing is cheaper to start but dearer to hold: on HORMĒ's whole-site cost modelling, leasing and buying cross over at around month twenty, so buying usually costs less for machines that will stay longer than that.
Making several robots work as one team
A mall that buys scrubbers from one maker, a guide robot from a second and a patrol robot from a third ends up with three apps, three maps and three schedules competing for the same service lifts and corridors. HORMĒ's Behavioral Intelligence layer sits above the vendors' own systems, so the machines share one map of the centre, one set of rules and one operator, and tasks are assigned against what is happening rather than a fixed timetable.
In a mall, the useful rules are about people and time. Typical policies include sending a scrubber to the food court once trading ends, keeping cleaning robots out of event spaces during an activation, holding machines clear of fire exits and escalator landings, slowing every robot near entrances at peak hours, and handing the floor over from cleaning to patrol robots at a set time. Getting robots from different vendors through shared lifts and doors is the problem the open-source framework Open-RMF addresses. See robot fleet management across vendors for how this compares with single-vendor fleet software.
How to start: a 90-day pilot
- Pick one zone and one measure. One concourse, one level or one car-park deck, with a clear measure: square metres cleaned per night, cleaning hours freed, or wayfinding questions answered.
- Bring the right people in early. Facilities, cleaning contractor, security, marketing and IT each own part of the decision; agree who can change routes and schedules.
- Survey the site. Floor finishes, ramps and expansion joints, lift and door controls, Wi-Fi coverage, charging and water points, and how crowds move at peak times and during events.
- Check approvals before shipment. Any robot with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or cellular modules needs TDRA type approval before it is used in the UAE; see robot import approvals in the UAE.
- Plan lead times. The machines in the table above take about 8 to 22 weeks to reach a UAE site, so order ahead of the peak shopping season.
- Run, measure, decide. A paid 90-day pilot shows what the machines actually do in your centre. The fleet order follows the results.
Safety in public areas
A mall is a public space, so the safety case is different from a warehouse. The ISO 3691-4 standard for driverless industrial trucks excludes vehicles operating in public zones and points to ISO 13482, the safety standard for personal care robots, for those settings; robots in concourses and car parks are assessed against the standards that fit the robot and the site. Behavior policies such as exclusion zones and reduced speed sit on top of each machine's own safety functions and do not replace them. See ISO 3691-4 explained for the industrial side.
How HORMĒ fits in
HORMĒ is a Behavioral Intelligence platform for autonomous machines, based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, that also supplies the machines. For malls and retail centres it supplies cleaning, guide, promotional and patrol robots across the UAE and GCC, handles the approvals before shipment, holds spares in the UAE and puts every machine under one behavior layer, licensed per machine per month. For other public buildings, see the companion guides to robots for hotels in the UAE, robots for hospitals in the UAE and robots for airports in the UAE.
Machine categories
Concourses, aisles, car parks Delivery and service robots
Guide and promotional robots Security and patrol robots
Indoor and outdoor patrol Platform pricing
Per machine, per month
Frequently asked questions
What robots do shopping malls in the UAE use?
Malls mainly use four kinds of robot: autonomous scrubber-dryers for atriums, concourses and retail aisles; semi-outdoor sweepers for entrances and car parks; guide and greeting robots for wayfinding and promotions; and indoor or outdoor patrol robots for rounds after closing. HORMĒ lists machines from Gausium, Avidbots, Tennant, Pudu Robotics, LG Electronics, Cobalt Robotics and Ascento for these jobs.
How much does a mall cleaning robot cost in the UAE?
On HORMĒ's indicative list, a large mall scrubber costs from about $72,000 (Avidbots Neo 2) to about $95,880 (Gausium Scrubber 75P), and a mid-size aisle scrubber from about $34,500 (Gausium Scrubber 50). Prices are in US dollars before VAT, installation and integration, and the HORMĒ Core licence adds $149 per machine per month.
How many cleaning robots does a large mall need?
HORMĒ's working estimate is that a super-regional shopping centre needs six to eight large autonomous scrubbers to cover its overnight cleaning windows. The real number depends on the floor plan, floor finishes, opening hours and how much daytime cleaning is needed, which a site survey and a 90-day pilot establish.
Is there a robot that gives directions to shoppers in Arabic?
Yes. The LG CLOi GuideBot, listed by HORMĒ from about $39,990, answers on a dual touchscreen and by voice in several languages including Arabic, runs for about 10 hours and can walk a visitor to a store. The smaller Pudu KettyBot, from about $8,900, handles greeting, guidance and mobile signage with footfall analytics.
Can robots patrol a mall and its car park at night?
Yes. An indoor patrol robot from Cobalt Robotics, listed from about $52,000, patrols several floors and rides the lifts, using thermal and visual sensors and passing anything unusual to a human operator to verify. For open-air car parks, the Ascento Guard outdoor patrol robot is listed from about $78,000.
How can robots from different makers work together in one mall?
Each manufacturer ships its own app and schedule. HORMĒ is a behavior layer that sits above them, so cleaning, guide and patrol robots from different vendors share one map of the centre, one set of rules and one operator, and are coordinated around trading hours, events, lifts and busy entrances.
Prices are indicative, in US dollars, and exclude VAT, installation and integration. They are compiled from published distributor pricing current to 2026 and are confirmed by quotation once the site and use case are known. Manufacturer names are used to identify equipment HORMĒ lists; trade marks belong to their owners. External sources: Emaar, "Emaar records highest ever sales, revenue and profit in 2024" (emaar.com, February 2025); Dubai Media Office, launch of the Dubai Robotics and Automation Program (September 2022). Checked 2026-10-15.
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