CCTY Bearing will discuss how its technologies can help humanoid robots at the Robotics Summit & Expo. Source: CCTY

To help robot developers make humanoid robots that emulate the mobility and flexibility of human limbs, CCTY designs and manufactures bespoke parts tailored to the unique requirements of each project. At the Robotics Summit & Expo this week, the global motion-control supplier will highlight how its state-of-the-art bearings can enable robots to move articulating joints with lifelike grace.

These critical joints must replicate the natural range of motion found in the human body while remaining lightweight and durable, according to CCTY. The company today said its customized approach overcomes the limitations of conventional, off-the-shelf products.

“The development of humanoid robots has garnered significant attention,” stated Yaman Obaid, robotics engineer at CCTY. “Their seamless motion is enabled by a complex interplay of precision engineering, advanced materials, and cutting-edge technology, with bearings serving as the base that enables these movements.”

CCTY builds bearings to suit

CCTY specializes in custom bearing engineering and development. The company has a 1.8 million sq. ft. (167,000 sq. m) production facility in China and offices in Lake Zurich, Ill.; Schwebheim, Germany; Tokyo; and Gujarat, India.

For the robotics sector, CCTY designs motion-control components and assemblies specific to humanoid and industrial robot applications. They include rod ends, spherical plain bearings, COM bearings, bushings, and roller bearings that enable articulating joints to rotate freely and smoothly.

“At the forefront of innovation, CCTY collaborates closely with our customers to design, develop, and test application-specific humanoid robotic bearing solutions,” said Nik Jerinic, strategic account manager at CCTY. “We’re not like other bearing suppliers. We are problem-solvers who work side-by-side with our clients to create a custom design that meets an application’s precise requirements.”

In addition to custom bearings, CCTY said it develops full assemblies that yield customer benefits such as cost savings, streamlined products, and simplified vendor management. With its ability to manufacture small batches, the company said it is as a trusted engineering partner to businesses in the fast-paced robotics industry.

Learn more at the Robotics Summit & Expo

At Booth 234 in Hall C at the Robotics Summit & Expo on May 1 and 2, CCTY said it will demystify the process of bearing design and assembly for robotic applications. It said its expertise and customer partnerships have resulted in systems that will advance the future of humanoid robots.

During the event, CCTY experts will also discuss key robotics industry trends and themes, including the importance of:

• Seals in robotics applications
• Finding the right balance for minimizing torque and clearance
• Backlash and its impact on humanoid movement

“When speaking with new and potential customers, our engineers often find that they’re able to present or share a new idea or enhancement, for example a new design idea or material selection, that improves upon the customer’s existing idea,” said Jerinic. “This is the type of partner CCTY wants to be for our robotics customers: Someone who helps them raise the bar in this high potential and fast-growing industry.”

Registration is now open for the Robotics Summit & Expo, which will be at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. The summit will also feature keynotes and sessions with industry experts, more than 200 exhibitors, a MassRobotics Engineering Career Fair, and several networking opportunities.

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Anzu is offering inspection drones for the U.S. market. Source: Anzu Robotics

While drones from SZ DKI Technology Co. arguably dominate the U.S. market for enterprise drone applications, Anzu Robotics LLC is preparing to serve operators that might be affected by a ban on the Chinese-made systems.

The DJI Matrice and DJI Mavic products both offer a wide range of sensor and payload options suitable for use in applications such as inspection, mapping, surveying, and search and rescue operations. In the past year, DJI has increasingly come under criticism because it is a Chinese state-owned business, and many DJI drones are used to inspect and map critical U.S. infrastructure.

New legislation approved by the House Energy and Commerce Committee on March 20 is part of ongoing efforts by federal and state governments to limit the usage of DJI drones in the U.S. There was unanimous agreement among the committee members, as both Republicans and Democrats supported the proposed restrictions, citing national security concerns.

The bills, the Countering CCP Drones Act and the Foreign Adversary Communications Transparency Act (download PDFs), are now under consideration in the full U.S. House.

“Congress must use every tool at our disposal to stop communist China’s monopolistic control over the [U.S.] drone market,” stated Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-New York), the primary sponsor of the bills cleared by the committee.

However, many industry insiders are skeptical of the proposed DJI drone ban, due in part to the heavy lobbying of U.S.-based uncrewed aerial systems (UAS) manufacturers such as Skydio that would like to displace DJI.

Such companies hope to gain more market share within the U.S. market, as autonomous commercial drone applications grow in popularity. In August, 2023, Skydio ended all sales of its drones to consumers to focus 100% on the enterprise market.

Learn from Agility Robotics, Amazon, Disney, Teradyne and many more.

What’s the possible impact of a U.S. ban on DJI drones?

A lot of commercial drone operators, including fire departments and other public-safety groups, have said that the Countering CCP Drones bill would make it illegal for DJI drones to use U.S. communications infrastructure. This isn’t a complete ban, but it would make DJI drones useless in the U.S., especially for any business, state, or local government that might use a DJI drone, they said.

The potential approval of the legislation has sent the commercial drone industry into a panic, especially search-and-rescue teams that have heavily invested in DJI drones for their operations.

Enter Austin, Texas-based Anzu Robotics.

The company recently announced its entrance into the U.S. drone market and the launch of its new Raptor and Raptor T enterprise drones. CEO Randall Warnas is a veteran in the drone industry, having worked at Autel and FLiR Systems earlier in his career.

Warnas said he recognized the potential impact of a DJI ban in the U.S. and saw an opportunity to fill a real need in the industry.

Using his network, Warnas reached a licensing deal with DJI to manufacture the Raptor drones in Malaysia, using the core design and internal chipset of the DJI Mavic 3 platform. He could then import and sell the drones in the U.S. under the Anzu Robotics brand.

The Mavic 3 Enterprise series drones are not the latest generation of drones from DJI — that would be the Mavic 3 Pro — but the platform is proven and liked by many industry professionals today. It is one of the most successful generations of DJI drones to date, according to Warnas.

The Raptor drone and remote controller in their signature green color. | Credit: Anzu Robotics

Aloft software meets country of origin mandate

On the software side, Warnas signed a deal with U.S.-based Aloft AI (formerly Kittyhawk) to provide the flight control software on the controller. The Aloft software source effectively meets the requirements for U.S.-based ownership and control of flight data as defined in the Countering CCP Drones bill. By manufacturing drones in Malaysia, Anzu Robotics meets the requirements for country of origin.

“At Aloft, we recognize that our customers have diverse operational needs which demand that everything they fly must be securely and compliantly integrated into the airspace,” said Jon Hegranes, founder and CEO of Aloft. “Our collaboration with Anzu Robotics on the Raptor series extends our commitment to providing versatile, cutting-edge drone solutions that ensure top-tier security and compliance for all stakeholders.”

The Raptor does not have geofencing or other unofficial flight restrictions. All airspace information is authoritative and authentic, as Aloft is an UAS Service Supplier (USS) approved by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

This comparison of the Anzu Robotics (left) and DJI Mavic 3 Enterprise (right) drones shows their similarities. | Credit: The Robot Report

Introducing the Anzu Robotics Raptor

Because Anzu’s drones are based on the DJI Mavic 3 Enterprise platform, they are equipped with a 4/3 CMOS sensor 20 MP wide-angle camera with a 56x hybrid zoom camera for 12MP images. Raptor T (for thermal) combines 1/2-inch 48MP and 12MP cameras with a 640×512 high-resolution LWIR thermal imaging payload, also with 56x hybrid zoom capabilities.

Similar to the Mavic 3, the Raptor boasts 45 minutes of flight time, a 9-mile range, and an optional RTK module accessory. Raptor will be backward-compatible with the DJI Intelligent Flight Battery from the DJI Mavic 3 drone.

Raptor is priced at $5,100, while Raptor T will sell for $7,600 in the U.S. This is more expensive than its DJI-badged Mavic cousin, but more competitive than U.S.-made counterparts such as Skydio and BRINC.

Anzu Robotics is targeting enterprise applications with the Raptor, as this is not a consumer platform. The company plans to focus in the coming year on building its its sales and partner distribution channels.

If the proposed legislation is passed and DJI is banned in the U.S., Anzu Robotics said it expects that existing DJI distribution partners would immediately move to it.

The Pilot Institute interviewed Randall Warnas about the company’s strategy and plans for the coming year.

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Left: Vivian Chu and Andrea Thomaz, the co-founders of Diligent Robotics; right: Kathleen Brandes and Ros Shinkle, the co-founders of Adagy Robotics. | Sources: Diligent Robotics, Adagy Robotics

Almost half of all startups that began in 2021 were formed by women, according to human resources cloud software company Gusto. Within the robotics industry, however, it’s a different story. Women make up only 34% of the STEM workforce, according to the National Girls Collaborative Project, and they hold only 16% of robotics and engineering roles. 

Those numbers, however, don’t tell us how many women start robotics companies. There isn’t a lot of data about the number of startups that begin every year or how many robotics companies are operating, in general. Let alone about the backgrounds of the founders behind them. 

To get a picture of how many women are founders of robotics companies, I combed through our 2024 February and March funding recaps. Of the 78 robotics companies that raised money during those two months, and whose founders could be identified, only 10 had a woman on their founding team, just 12.8%.

Of course, this metric doesn’t tell us how many robotics companies in general have female founders, but it does give us a better idea of what that breakdown might look like. This is why I spoke to Ros Shinkle and Kathleen Brandes, the founders of Adagy Robotics, and Andrea Thomaz and Vivian Chu, the founders of Diligent Robotics, about their experiences within the industry. 

Founders talk about the early days of a startup

Diligent and Adagy are in two very different places as companies. Adagy launched earlier this year, and it specializes in remote intervention services. Shinkle and Brandes are at the beginning of their journey as founders and are part of Y Combinator, a startup accelerator. They’re currently the only employees of the company. 

“Adagy Robotics is currently a remote intervention service for rescuing robots,” said Brandes, the company’s chief technology officer (CTO).

“For example, when a tractor robot fails in the field, instead of calling out to the farmer who has a lot more important things to do in his day, that tractor robot can now call out to our trained operators,” she said. “They’ll take over, drive the robot to safety, and allow it to resume its autonomous operations.”

Adagy looks to a future with AI

Today, Adagy Robotics is starting out with fully human-driven operations, said Shinkle, CEO. In the future, however, the company is interested in layering machine learning and generative AI techniques to assist human operators and allow them to do their jobs more efficiently. The company is also exploring error-prevention techniques for robots. 

“We’re really excited about logistics and manufacturing right now,” Shinkle said. “In particular, I think AMRs [autonomous mobile robots] are widely used in logistics. And although they’re widely used, they still continue to face the same kinds of problems.”

“For example, they often rely on these sort of dense visual clues called fiducials or APR tags to help localize in a facility,” she noted. “If one of those is scuffed or torn or falls down, the robots can get lost. This is a great example of a situation in which we could come in and help the robots get back safely. We’re also excited about manipulation and failed picking tasks as well.”

Shinkle and Brandes described the early days of running a startup as challenging but fun. Every day is about putting out the most urgent fire, said Shinkle.

Ros Shinkle and Kathleen Brandes, the founders of Adagy Robotics, met at Boston Dynamics. Source: Y Combinator

Bringing a startup to maturity 

On the other hand, Diligent Robotics was founded in 2017. Like many robotics companies, Diligent started in a research lab. Thomaz, the company’s co-founder and CEO, was running a robotics lab that Chu, its co-founder and CTO, joined as a Ph.D. student in 2012.

The start of the company was slow, Thomaz said. She was still a professor and Chu a graduate student. Tomaz’s lab earned two National Science Foundation grants that gave Tomaz and Chu the opportunity to learn from around 150 people in the healthcare industry. 

“I don’t know that we would have been able to start this company as two men,” Thomaz said. “Because the thing that we did, for two years at least, was go and embed ourselves in nursing teams, with a robot, and ask nurses, who are 80% women, ‘What would you have this robot do?’”

“I’m not sure we would have been as accepted in that community as a couple of guys with their robot,” she continued. 

Once they had found a use case that would address the needs of the industry, Thomaz and Chu said they spent a summer pitching and looking for venture capital. In total, Thomaz said they spent a year and a half in the research stage before officially launching the company.

Last year, Diligent hit 90 robots working in the field. Its flagship robot, Moxi, aids hospital staffers by performing non-patient-facing tasks like running supplies, delivering lab samples, fetching items from a central supply, distributing personal protective equipment (PPE), and delivering medications. Moxi is now opening 100,000 doors every month across its various deployments.

Diligent is dedicated to diversity

As Diligent Robotics has grown, Thomaz and Chu said they’ve actively tried to keep the company diverse. 

“Early on, we recognized that it’s not only important to have a diverse team, but to have a diverse team at all levels,” Thomaz said. “It’s really good to make sure that your most junior people aren’t the most diverse, and then your more senior people are all one type of person.”

Chu also said the team focused on making job postings well-known among all intersections of the robotics community, instead of just relying on the applications that passively came in. Shinkle echoed similar sentiments when talking about building Adagy’s team as it grows. 

“We believe that diversity is a strength,” Shinkle said. “Diversity of background and diversity of thought leads to stronger problem solving, so that’s definitely a closely held company belief.” 

Female founders find community within the industry 

All four of the women I spoke to both emphasized the importance of finding mentors and a community within the industry. 

“One thing that’s been really helpful is the amazing community, unity, and friendship that women have within the industry,” Brandes said. “We’ve become great friends and are now starting a company together, as one example. And I think fostering that community and having that community continue to grow and expand has been a big component.” 

“For me, it was fantastic seeing these role models that blaze through all of the stereotypes,” Chu said. “It really gives me the confidence to do the same.”

“I’ve had friends that obviously didn’t have that experience, and it’s hard hearing what they’ve had to go through,” she acknolwedged. “I’ve been very lucky to have some amazing champions throughout a lot of my career.” 

The founders also had advice to share with women who are considering starting a robotics company. 

“Reach out to as many people for advice as possible, because there’s so many that have gone through the startup journey,” Chu said. “If you collect a wide variety of people that you can reach out to … you can just continually ask questions.”

“My advice would be to just do it,” Brandes said. “Be confident that your are strong enough and successful enough to do this.” 

“I think robotics is a great place for female leadership,” Thomaz said. “Historically, there’s been a lot of really great trailblazers, and some people who’ve really defined the field like Manuela Veloso and Maya Tarik, and there are a bunch of other people that I’m not naming.”

“But I think that in and of itself makes robotics a great place for women to lead the way in commercialization as well,” she concluded. “It’s a big, broad systems-level problem, which I think requires a diverse solution, and so that’s ripe for a really diverse team.”

Editor’s note: The Robotics Summit & Expo this week will be hosting a Women in Robotics Breakfast and the MassRobotics Engineering Career Fair, among other networking events.

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Forcen says its technology will help robotic manipulation advance as vision has. Source: Forcen

Forcen last week said it has closed a funding round of CAD $8.35 million ($6.1 million U.S.). The Toronto-based company plans to use the investment to scale up production to support more customers and to continue developing its force/torque sensing technology and edge intelligence.

“We’ve been focused on delivering custom solutions showcasing our world-first technology with world-class quality … and we’re excited for our customers to announce the robots they’ve been working on with our technology,” stated Robert Brooks, founder and CEO of Forcen. “Providing custom solutions has limited the number of customers we take on, but now we’re working to change that.”

Founded in 2015, Forcen said its goal is to enable businesses to easily deploy “(super)human” robotic manipulation in complex and unstructured applications. The company added that its technology is already moving into production with customers in surgical, logistics, humanoid, and space robotics.

Forcen offers two paths to robot manipulation

Forcen said its new customizable offering and off-the-shelf development kits will accelerate development for current customers and help new ones adopt its technology.

The rapidly customizable offering will use generative design and standard subassemblies, noted the company. This will allow customers to select the size, sensing range/sensitivity, overload protection, mounting bolt pattern, and connector type/location.

By fulfilling orders in as little as four to six weeks, Forcen claimed that it can replace the traditional lengthy catalog of sensors, so customers can get exactly what they need for their unique applications.

The company will launch its off-the-shelf development kits later this year. They will cover three degree-of-freedom (DoF) and 6 DoF force/torque sensors, as well as Forcen’s cross-roller, bearing-free 3 DoF joint torque sensor and 3 DoF gripper finger.

Off-the-shelf development kits will support different degrees of freedom. Source: Forcen

Force/torque sensors designed for complex applications

Complex and less-structured robotics applications are challenging for conventional force/torque sensing technologies because of the risk of repeated impact/overload, wide temperature ranges/changes, and extreme constraints on size and weight, explained Forcen. These applications are becoming increasingly common in surgical, logistics, agricultural/food, and underwater robotics.

Forcen added that its “full-stack” sensing systems are designed for such applications using three core proprietary technologies:

• ForceFilm — A monolithic thin-film transducer enabling sensing systems that are lighter, thinner, more stable across both drift and temperature, the company said. It is especially scalable for multi-dimensional sensing, Forcen said.
• Dedicated Overload — A protection structure that acts as a 6 DoF hard stop. The company said it allows sensitivity and overload protection to be designed separately and enables durable use of the overload structure for thousands of overload events while still achieving millions of sensing cycles.
• Synap — Forcen’s onboard edge intelligence comes factory compensated/calibrated and can connect to any standard digital bus (USB, CAN, Ethernet, EtherCAT). This can “create a full-stack force/torque sensing solution that is truly plug-and-play with a maintenance/calibration-free operation.

New offerings include features to support demanding robotics applications. Source: Forcen

Learn about Forcen at the Robotics Summit

Brightspark Ventures and BDC Capital’s Deep Tech Venture Fund co-led Forcen’s funding round, with participation from Garage Capital and MaRS IAF, as well as returning investors including EmergingVC.

“Robotic vision has undergone a revolution over the past decade and is continuing to accelerate with new AI approaches,” said Mark Skapinker, co-founder and partner at Brightspark Ventures. “We expect robotic manipulation to quickly follow in the footsteps of robotic vision and Forcen’s technology to be a key enabler of ubiquitous human-level robotic manipulation.”

Forcen is returning to the Robotics Summit & Expo this week. It will have live demonstrations of its latest technology in Booth 113 at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. 

CEO Brooks will be talking on May 1 at 4:15 p.m. EDT about “Designing (Super)Human-Level Haptic Sensing for Surgical Robotics.” Registration is now open for the event, which is co-located with DeviceTalks Boston and the Digital Transformation Forum.

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Titan Medical Inc. this week provided a progress update regarding its planned merger with Conavi Inc. They said the combined entity will continue working to commercialize Conanvi’s Novasight Hybrid system for guiding minimally invasive coronary procedures.

Toronto-based Conavi Medical designs, makes, and sells imaging technologies for guiding cardiovascular procedures. Novasight Hybrid combines intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) and optical coherence tomography (OCT) to enable simultaneous and co-registered imaging of coronary arteries. The system has FDA 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Conavi and Titan said they are continuing work on the all-stock transaction under a definitive amalgamation agreement first announced last month. That includes the preparation of submissions to list Titan shares on the TSX Venture Exchange. That listing would follow de-listing from the Toronto Stock Exchange.

The companies said they also plan to complete Titan’s management information circular and related documents. Titan plans to hold a special meeting for shareholders to approve the transaction and related matters.

In addition, Conavi said it is preparing concurrent financing of subscription receipts worth at least $15 million and up to $20 million.

Titan Medical licenses IP, evaluates options

Toronto-based Titan Medical had developed patented technology for robot-assisted surgery (RAS), including through a single access point. This merger comes after more than a year of uncertainty around the future of the company.

In late 2022, Titan suspended a special meeting of shareholders meant to vote on a share consolidation plan. Management decided to begin a strategic review, and announced significant cost-cutting measures.

Titan went on to halt development of its ENOS surgical robot in February 2023. The company began selling assets and licensed much of its intellectual property (IP) to Intuitive Surgical to avoid insolvency.

The company said it is focused on “evaluating new opportunities to further develop and license its intellectual property while pursuing the completion of its agreed-upon merger with Conavi Medical.”

Editor’s note: This article was syndicated from The Robot Report sibling site MassDevice. Learn more about robots for surgery and other applications at next week’s Robotics Summit & Expo and co-located DeviceTalks Boston.

The events will include speakers from Medtronic, Asensus Surgical, Intuitive Surgical, and more, as well as the MassRobotics Healthcare Catalyst Showcase. Registration is now open for the Robotics Summit & Expo, which also features sessions and exhibits with industry leaders, an Engineering Career Fair, and networking opportunities.

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The Gentle Duo Mini soft grippers are suitable for food handling. Source: Ubiros

Reliable and delicate robotic grasping has long been a challenge, but Ubiros Inc. said it can solve the problem without the bulky pneumatics or complex coding of previous approaches.

The company’s electrically driven and modular grippers are easier to deploy and use than other soft grippers, according to Onder Ondemir, president of Ubiros. He is also a professor in the engineering department at Northeastern University.

Ubiros offers the Gentle Flex Module and Gentle Flex CC for users that want to build their own grippers. The spinout of Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) also offers Gentle Duo with two soft fingers and Gentle Pro with four fingers, as well as Touch models for both that include force control, part sensing/confirmation, and a low-power mode.

The Natick, Mass.-based company said its compliant grippers are suitable for food handling and packaging, textiles, and some warehouse applications. Ubiros, which is a resident startup at MassRobotics, already has distributor agreements in China, South Korea, Turkey, the U.K., and the U.S.

Founder fascinated by technology

“I loved Knight Rider as a kid and asked my mom, ‘Who makes [smart car] KITT? What do I need to become to make something like that?’” recalled Ondemir. “She said ‘mechanical engineer.’”

“I grew up and became an industrial engineer, but I’ve always been fascinated with mechanical systems,” he told The Robot Report. “I worked at an insurance company modeling the capacity of systems and demand forecasts, and I became a vice president.”

Ondemir later ran into a friend [Cagdas Onal] who was doing post-doctoral associate work at MIT and collaborating with Harvard University researchers working on soft robotics.

“We knew the limitations of pneumatics – precision is low, control is hard, and the equipment needed to generate compressed air uses a lot of electricity,” he said. “After spending years in the lab, one day, he came to me and said, ‘Onder, I think I have groundbreaking technology for packaging and gripping in general, but I don’t want to run the company.’ Becoming the CEO was a no-brainer to fulfill my desire to build machines and work with my friend.”

Ubiros President Onder Ondemir at MassRobotics. Source: Ubiros

The genesis of Ubiros

Ubiros has largely focused on food handling.

Automating the handling of fruit and baked goods is not easy, because such delicate food items are easily damaged, Ondemir noted. Rigid grippers typically don’t have sufficient sensitivity, and many other companies are trying to solve problems such as object detection and singulation, he said.

“In farming, crops are being left to rot in the field, which is a huge waste,” added Ondemir. “A key barrier to getting automation is handling food with a soft touch.”

“But the real problem we’re solving is the worker shortage,” he said. “Harvesting and packing jobs aren’t interesting to people, and there are the issues of efficiency for the employer – most people work one shift – and also injuries and finally the cost of food.”

Fingers versus suction cups

For most applications where similar items are picked, suction cups are sufficient, said Ondemir. However, when there’s clutter, such as in e-commerce bins, or tight spaces like bookshelves, picking then requires a combination of sensing to identify each object and the ability to singulate that object.

Suction cups are versatile, but porous, dusty, fragile, or oddly weighted items are not always suitable for suction cups, Ondemir observed.

“We’re proud to be one of the few companies developing individual finger actuation rather than the whole hand,” he said. “For singulation, it can provide alternatives in complex picking situations.”

Ubiros Gentle grippers promise benefits

Ubiros’ Gentle grippers use electric servo motors and a cable-driven system similar to the tendons of the human hand.

“The difficulty in designing the system was maintaining softness while mechanically operating the finger – that’s where our patent is,” Ondemir said. “Our technology allows the finger unit to be flexible in the grasping direction but very rigid in twisting or bending sideways.”

Electric end-of-arm tooling (EOAT) removes the need for tubes, valves, and compressors, he said. Also, while pneumatic systems need to cycle to attempt another grasp, an electric one can reposition more quickly.

In addition, electric grippers have instant torque rather than needing to build up pressure for heavy payloads as hydraulic or pneumatic systems do, said Ondemir.

Up to 35% of the electricity bill in factories is spent on pressurized air, and 40% of the battery life of a mobile manipulator is consumed by a suction cup, he asserted. Thus, Ubiros’ grippers could save a lot of battery power for autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) or drones, Ondemir said.

Is Ubiros looking at mobile manipulation?

“We’ve had serious conversations with Staubli,” Ondemir replied. “Our gripper would be in addition to its existing arm and base, unlike others.”

In addition, United Robotics Group has integrated Ubiros’ gripper with a mobile manipulator that will be demonstrated at Automate.

Ondemir surveys tech trends

Beyond mobile manipulation, Ondemir relied on his experience in robotics development to comment on current tech trends.

“Artificial intelligence and machine learning allow us to implement predictive maintenance,” he said. “Our electrical micro-controller is partly a system for force control and partly sensing. It’s able to collect temperature data from inside the gripper, plus cycle counts and electric current to build models to predict failures. That’s in our roadmap.”

Ubiros is not currently working with digital twins because it’s difficult to know the actual deflection of soft objects and where something is in space, acknowledged Ondemir. A lot of research is being devoted to this topic, he said.

What about humanoids? “They’ll have to have soft components for safety and to guard against falling,” Ondemir said. “This will be a key use for soft robotics in general, not just soft grippers. Because we’re a spinoff of WPI, we already have soft 3D sensors and a patented design of a soft arm, but there’s a lot still to do.”

Mechanical intelligence for manipulation

“The idea behind what we call ‘mechanical intelligence’ is that if you can mechanically achieve something, you need expensive programming, motion control, and vision less,” said Ondemir. “We built something that is under-actuated, with fewer motors to move the joints. Electric actuation allows us to have full-bodied fingers rather than hollow ones that can be punctured or leak in otherwise sanitary environments.”

“Depending on the shape of the object, the gripper can automatically conform to it. It’s more forgiving of inaccuracies, and you don’t need extreme precision,” he continued. “Because the grippers bend themselves over an object like an egg or an apple, the force is distributed over a larger area.”

Ubiros did build some force control into its Gentle grippers, allowing users to increase or decrease pressure, but it’s not necessary in most cases, Ondemir said.

Ubiros and its partners recently participated in a MassRobotics Demo Day. Source: Ubiros

Ubiros looks ahead

The Gentle gripper is initially tackling labeling and grading of tomatoes and cucumbers, and Ubiros has received a lot of interest recently from bakeries, said Ondemir. A hygienic gripper could then address handling of raw beef, poultry, and fish.

To that end, Ubiros is looking for funding to make its grippers more hygienic and robust against cleaning agents. It is working on safe-food handling certifications.

On the industrial side, Ubiros is conducting a pilot with Mitsubishi to handle a variety of objects and manage robot grasping through Mitsubishi’s teach pendant.

“Down the road a few years, we want to focus more on the data side, allowing customers to access data through the end effectors,” Ondemir said. “We plan to eventually bring other patented technologies into the workplace – 3D sensors, haptic gloves, human-in-the-loop systems, remote manipulation, and soft arms.”

Ubiros will be at the Robotics Summit & Expo next week and Automate the week after that.

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The new Humanoid Robot Innovation Center is located in Zhejiang, China. | Credit: SUPCON

Over the past few years, the race to develop humanoid robots for commercial use has accelerated. SUPCON Technology Co. this month announced the Zhejiang Humanoid Robot Innovation Center and the debut of its first self-developed humanoid, Navigator α.

Founded in 1993, SUPCON provides control and safety systems, monitoring and optimization software, and measurement hardware and software. The Hangzhou, China-based company went public on the SIX Swiss Exchange in April 2023, raising $565 million, according to Crunchbase.

SUPCON’s product line includes offerings for energy management, supply chain management, industrial safety, and simulation. It also supports security and inspection tasks with wheeled and legged robots that can include an array of onboard sensors.

SUPCON’s current product line includes both a wheeled platform and a quadruped robot. | Credit: SUPCON

SUPCON unveils humanoid robot

The company launched a new humanoid robot, signaling its intentions to compete in the burgeoning humanoid space that is already becoming crowded with systems from many global and regional companies.

The Navigator α is 1.5 m (4.9 ft.) tall and weighs 50 kg (110 lb.). It has lightweight mechanical arms with a dexterous hand and multiple degrees of freedom. This hand features 15 finger joints, six active degrees of freedom, a fingertip force of 10N, a lightweight design of 600 g (1.3 lb.), and a joint speed of 150 degrees per second.

SUPCON said it plans to integrate large-scale AI models to achieve an intelligent human interface. The company claimed that Navigator α has been deployed in several field-proven projects.

The future of humanoid robots will depend on their utilization in specific scenarios and industries, said SUPCON. It said its near-term focus will be on bridging the gap between technological research and industrial demand to continue the progress.

The new Navigator α humanoid robot is the latest innovation from SUPCON. | Credit: SUPCON

New center to foster industry-academia interaction

SUPCON said its new innovation center aims to facilitate partnerships between academic institutions and industries in the area of humanoid robotics, as well as explore the potential uses of these robots in various industrial settings. The center’s primary focus is on intelligent sensing and control technologies, while it also works toward the development of fully operational robots.

The Zhejiang Humanoid Robot Innovation Center will function as a hub for technical research, product development, the nurturing of talent, and industrial growth, said SUPCON. The company said its investment in the center follows its strategic objective of seamlessly integrating artificial intelligence with robotics and supporting the evolution of the humanoid robot sector in China.

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The 2024 RBR50 Robotics Innovation Awards have recognized the Mushiny Intelligent 3D Sorter. Source: Mushiny

WTWH Media has named Mushiny Co. a 2024 RBR50 Robotics Innovation Award winner this month. It recognized the Suzhou, China-based company for its Intelligent 3D Sorter as an innovative technology.

“This recognition highlights China’s global innovation and marks a significant step for Mushiny in smart warehouse logistics,” said the company.

The annual RBR50 awards honor the top 50 robotics companies for their leadership in automation hardware and software, business models, and emerging applications.

“The incredible products of this year’s RBR50 winners represent the cutting edge of robotics technology and also raise the bar for the industry,” stated Steve Crowe, WTWH’s executive editor for robotics. WTWH Media produces The Robot Report, Mobile Robot Guide, and the Robotics Summit & Expo.

3D Sorter pioneers efficiency, flexibility

Mushiny has publicly shown that its Intelligent 3D Sorter can overcome sorting challenges beyond the capabilities of traditional methods, including handling spikes in business, sorting soft goods, documentation, fragile items such as books, and traceable pharmaceuticals and food. It said the system is innovative for the supply chain industry in three ways: high sorting efficiency, strong flexibility, and optimal return on investment (ROI).

The company cited the following potential benefits:

• Improvement in order-fulfilment efficiency, with the highest efficiency exceeding 10,000 picks per hour (up to 14,400 items per hour)
• Sorting efficiency increased by three to five times.
• Better ROI
• Save 70% of space compared with the traditional cross-belt sorter

“Mushiny’s Intelligent 3D Sorter automates the picking process and enables warehouse operations to grow their batch or wave sizes,” noted The Robot Report. “The Intelligent3D Sorter could fulfill many orders concurrently, as robots continuously transfer completed orders and buffer them as needed before dispatching. The combination of robots and human pickers could increase retail and e-commerce productivity, as well as efficiently process returns.”

Meet Mushiny at the Robotics Summit & Expo

Founded in 2016, Mushiny is a leading global provider of intelligent systems for logistics. The company operates across more than 20 countries and regions, with overseas markets making up 50% of its business.

Mushiny Intelligence has two business divisions: The Intelligent Warehousing Division offers clients bespoke intelligent intralogistics systems and guarantees 60-day delivery worldwide. The Standard Products Division specializes in customizing robot chassis, delivering a range of software and hardware services to partners and clients with development capabilities.

The company said it empowers global partners and users in e-commerce, postal and courier, automobiles, new energy, household appliances, 3C (computers, communications and consumer) electronics, and many other industrial and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) applications.

Mushiny will be at Booth 448-3 at the Robotics Summit & Expo, which will be on May 1 and 2 at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. The event will also include keynotes by industry leaders, more than 60 speakers in 40 sessions, 200 exhibitors, several networking opportunities, a MassRobotics Engineering Career Fair, and the co-located Digital Transformation Forum and DeviceTalks Boston.

This year’s RBR50 honorees will also be celebrated in the inaugural RBR50 Gala and a showcase on the expo floor. Registration is now open for next week’s summit.

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Sanctuary’s seventh-generation Phoenix includes both hardware and software improvements. | Source: Sanctuary AI

Sanctuary AI today unveiled the seventh generation of its Phoenix humanoid robot. The Vancouver-based company said its upgraded robot is bringing it closer to the creation of the world’s first “human-like intelligence in general-purpose robots.”

This announcement comes less than 12 months after the company launched its sixth-generation robot, and less than 16 months after it first commercially deployed its fifth-generation humanoid in January 2023.

In this week-long pilot deployment, Phoenix worked at a Mark’s retail store in Langley, British Columbia. In that trial, Phoenix successfully completed 110 retail-related tasks, claimed Sanctuary Cognitive Systems Corp., which was founded in 2018 and does business as Sanctuary AI. 

The company said it made numerous improvements to both the robot’s hardware and its AI control system Carbon.

“It’s incredible to see the progress that has been made in just 11 months,” stated Geordie Rose, co-founder and CEO of Sanctuary AI. “With Generation 7, we have a system that we believe is the most closely analogous to a person of any available.”

“We see this as not only the cornerstone of general-purpose AI robotics but a critical step on the path to artificial general intelligence, and we’re thrilled to be leading the charge on it,” he added. “This all adds up to being able to capture increasing quantities of higher-quality, higher-fidelity human behavioral data, which in turn will expedite the development of foundational AI models and customer deployments.”

This generation of Phoenix excels at human behavioral data capture, giving Carbon access to some of the best training data available. the company asserted. 

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Sanctuary AI obtains IP toward general-purpose robots

In December 2023, Sanctuary AI announced that it had acquired intellectual property (IP), adding to its asset portfolio of touch and grasping technologies. At the time, the company said it expected the assets from Giant.AI Inc. and Tangible Research to play a pivotal role in its construction of general-purpose robots.

Sanctuary AI credited these IP assets with expanding its patent portfolio centered around grasping technology. These include visual servoing, real-time simulation of the grasping process, and mapping between visual and haptic data. While it not confirm whether they went into Phoenix, it seems likely.

Phoenix includes several upgrades 

Sanctuary listed the following the upgrades in its latest release:

• Phoenix now has increased uptime, which means that it has more time for training and data capture. 
• The robot also now has increased build and commissioning speed, allowing Sanctuary to bring more units online faster. 
• Sanctuary has reduced Phoenix’s bill of materials, reducing the cost of manufacture. 
• The company has increased range of motion in the wrists, hands, and elbows. It has also increased hand durability. 
• Sanctuary said it further miniaturized hydraulics, resulting in reduced weight, power consumption, and complexity, with increased hardware and software measures that exceed specified safety standards. 
• Phoenix has improved visual acuity and tactile sensing, leading to higher-fidelity data to train the AI control system. 
• The time it takes for new tasks to be automated has gone from weeks to less than 24 hours, marking a major inflection point in task automation speed and autonomous system capability.

Earlier this month, Sanctuary AI announced a strategic partnership with Magna International. Through this expanded partnership, the company plans to equip Magna’s automotive component factories with general-purpose AI robots. It also plans to engage Magna to manufacture the Phoenix robots under contract in the future. 

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UR cobots are can now use SRCI, a standard interface between PLCs and robots. | Source: Universal Robots

Collaborative robots are designed to be easy to use, but they also need to work with other systems. Universal Robots A/S announced that it has integrated the Standard Robot Command Interface, or SRCI, into its software. The Odense, Denmark-based company claimed that it is among the first cobot vendors to offer this functionality.

“By having our robots connect seamlessly to a global industry leader like Siemens, we can now offer our partners and customers, both existing and prospective, faster integration and higher ease of use,“ stated Daniel Friedman, global director of strategic partnerships at Universal Robots. “We strive to make cobot automation as simple as possible for our customers, and this is yet another step in our commitment to provide automation for anyone, anywhere.”

Universal Robots said SRCI is available for its e-Series family of cobots and the next-generation UR20 and UR30. It can be installed and activated with PolyScope Version 5.15 or higher using the URcap software add-on. 

SRCI offers a universal interface for robot makers

Siemens said SRCI is a new standard for robot manufacturers that aims to create a single interface between programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and robots. It aims to reduce service and maintenance complexity through a single robot library and enhanced connectivity. 

Universal Robots added that the uniform cross-platform data interface of the SRCI will make robot implementation interoperable. It also standardizes definitions and robot commands between UR collaborative robots and Siemens PLCs.

“This allows for easier and quicker setup and simplifies the deployment of UR robots into existing and new Siemens ecosystem-based production lines,” the company said. Earlier this month, Siemens, Universal Robots, and 3D camera vendor Zivid said they have joined forces to help automate intralogistics fulfillment.

Siemens asserted that it “is the first — and currently only — PLC vendor supporting SRCI in the automation market.” 

“We are encouraged that cobots from Universal Robots can now be controlled via the SRCI and can be programmed by Simatic users,” said Rolf Heinsohn, senior vice president of factory automation segment control at Siemens.

“We want to accelerate factory automation and scale the use of robots in industry by making them simple and available to all our customers` employees,” he added. “It is a great advantage for our customers to be able to easily integrate and use UR’s robots together with the Siemens PLCs in their production.”

Catch up with Teradyne at the Robotics Summit

Universal Robots is a subsidiary of Teradyne Inc. Ujjwal Kumar, group president of Teradyne Robotics, will be giving a keynote presentation at the Robotics Summit & Expo next week. In it, he will share some lessons he has learned and how they can be applied to accelerate the transformation of industry with robotics.

An RBR50 Robotics Innovation Award Winner, Universal Robots will be among the organizations honored at the inaugural RBR50 Gala.

Registration is now open for the Robotics Summit & Expo, which will be on May 1 and 2 at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. The event will include more than 200 exhibitors, various networking opportunities, a Women in Robotics breakfast, a career fair, an engineering theater, a startup showcase, and more.

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HowToRobot is combining its marketplace with Gain & Co.’s expert advice. Credit: Adobe Stock

HowToRobot.com ApS, a provider of a global automation market platform, and Gain & Co., a robotics and automation advisor, announced a merger last week. The newly formed company has also received an investment from Sagitta Ventures, which will be taking a seat on its board. 

Now operating under the name “HowToRobot,” the combined company said that while the need for robotics is stronger than ever, most businesses still struggle to automate. By combining its automation market and vendor-independent advice, HowToRobot said it will support businesses with every aspect of their automation journeys.  

“Businesses need automation and robotics like never before to make up for labor shortages and supply chain disruptions and simply to protect them in the long run,” stated Søren Peters, now co-CEO of HowToRobot. “But without help, only few are able to fully take advantage of the technology. The merger and investment allow us to extend that help to every business that needs it.”

Founded in 2017, HowToRobot said it offers companies with an overview and easy access to automation and robotics suppliers globally. It also offers advisors that give guidance on everything from getting started with automation to technology selection and implementation.

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HowToRobot to help companies keep up with innovation

Global robot installations have more than tripled over the past decade, according to the International Federation of Robotics (IFR). This demand has resulted in more innovation, making it difficult for prospective customers to keep up with the industry, said Peters. 

“Robotics is developing so fast that it can easily seem overwhelming,” he said. “What most need is often just someone to talk to who knows the market and who they can trust for reliable and impartial advice. By letting our two companies join forces, we can now provide all that in one place.”

The Copenhagen, Denmark-based company claimed that the new HowToRobot provides the support that businesses need when looking to automate. At the R-24 event earlier this year in Odense, Denmark, Gulshan Akhtar Din, a senior advisor then at Gain & Co., explained how it worked with hospitals to properly integrate automation with both physical infrastructure and business processes.

Despite global robot installations hitting a record high in 2022, according to the IFR, HowToRobot said it has found that the average business has explored only about 5% of its addressable potential for automation. Peters asserted that this is mainly due to limited expertise and knowledge about automation. 

“Most businesses have still only scratched the surface of what is possible and makes sense to automate,” he said. “With the right guidance and easy access to potential solutions, robot adoption can reach a whole new level.”

Inside the merger

With the merger, Peters, the former CEO of HowToRobot, and Søren Pap-Tolstrup, the former CEO of Gain & Co., will serve as co-CEOs. The company did not disclose financial details of the merger or investment from Sagitta Ventures. 

“The world of robotics is still new to many, and most need help to some extent – from technical advice to finding solutions and building the business case or simply finding the best place to start,” noted Pap-Tolstrup. “When combined, our platform and advisory have the depth, reach, and flexibility to support businesses where and when they most need it.”

HowToRobot said its latest investment will enable it to expand its platform, advisor team, and partner network across the world, adding expertise and the capacity for conducting on-site automation screening. The company said it also plans to broaden its market understanding of robotics and automation to better provide expert advice.

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Outrider has obtained more patents to automate movement of semi-trailers. Source: Outrider

Between the automated warehouse and self-driving long-haul vehicles, there is the opportunity to add robotics to yard management. Outrider Technologies Inc. today announced that it has received its latest patent, which covers the task of determining where a trailer is in respect to a self-driving tractor.

U.S. Patent No. 11,927,676, for the “Systems and Methods for Determining an Articulated Trailer Angle,” will facilitate safe and accurate autonomous trailer movement in all weather conditions, claimed the Brighton, Colo.-based company.

“Outrider’s patent portfolio covers the numerous inventions, innovations, and technologies our team developed to re-define the logistics yard,” stated Andrew Smith, founder and CEO of Outrider. “In 2017, we recognized that autonomously moving 50,000-lb. semi-trailers day and night in all weather conditions would require unique inventions to dramatically improve the efficiency, safety, and sustainability of the global supply chain.”

“One of the biggest pain points we learned about was losing trailers,” he told The Robot Report at Manifest. “Yard operations have been the same for decades, and there’s pent-up demand because of labor turnover, the need for safety, and hundreds of billions of dollars tied up in warehouses.”

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Outrider builds robotics portfolio

Once trucks get to the yard, hitching and unhitching trailers can be hazardous and repetitive, noted Outrider. The private company said its customers represent more than 20% of all yard trucks operating in North America.

In January, Outrider raised $73 million in Series C financing. It has employees in 10 countries developing and supporting its industrial-grade technology.

“Over-the-road trucks may wait up to four hours to get a trailer, during which drivers don’t get paid, and that’s dead time for just-in-time fulfillment,” Smith said. “We’ve been training deep learning models with data from hundreds of yards.”

The company’s electric systems could reduce idling of diesel-powered vehicles, which in North America alone could save 3.8 billion metric tons of carbon, he asserted.

The latest patent joins a portfolio covering “the core technologies required for automating yards,” said Outrider. It has one or more patents or patents pending covering the following:

Autonomous yard operations

Outrider said it invented an “end-to-end system for safely moving trailers autonomously.” This includes navigating obstacles in complex environments, hitching and unhitching from trailers using autonomous fifth wheel movement, and connecting and disconnecting brake lines.

The system also enables precise backing to warehouse dock doors and parking spots. In addition, it can track trailer inventory, monitor electric yard-truck charging, and manage autonomous operations.

Robotic connection of air brake and electrical lines 

TrailerConnect is Outrider’s branded adapter-based and adapterless method for connecting and disconnecting air brake and electrical lines on autonomous yard trucks to modified or unmodified semi-trailers and chassis.

Using deep learning, the commercial robotic arm will rapidly connect and disconnect to unmodified trailers in less than 30 seconds, said the company. Trailers outfitted with low-cost adapters will connect within seconds, it said. 

Loading dock operations

Outrider explained that its innovations focus on safe, autonomous operations at the loading dock – the connection point between the inside and outside of the facility. Autonomous yard trucks communicate with proprietary dock door safety systems to determine whether a dock is ready for loading or unloading.

The company’s dock door modifications allow swing doors on trailers and shipping containers on chassis to be opened and resealed inside the facility while the trailer remains at the loading dock. Outrider said this and subsequent patents will allow it to solve the challenge of opening and closing swing doors when operating automated yard trucks.

Outrider said its systems integrate with warehouse, yard, and transportation management systems.

TrailerConnect uses a robotic arm to connect air brake and electrical lines. Source: Outrider

Outrider patent efforts advance

Outrider now has 11 issued patents and over 50 pending patents in the U.S. and internationally. Shortly after its first patent was issued in August 2021, the company used its proprietary technology to perform fully autonomous trailer moves at Georgia-Pacific in November 2021.

Since then, Outrider said it has completed tens of thousands of autonomous trailer moves for customers in the package shipping, consumer packaged goods, automotive manufacturing, retail and e-commerce, and intermodal industries. 

“This patent portfolio demonstrates the Outrider team’s continued commitment to automating the vast array of manual, repetitive tasks involved in inhospitable yard environments,” said Vittorio Ziparo, chief technology officer and executive vice president of engineering at Outrider. “These inventions, combined with relentless attention to the safety, reliability, and scalability of our technology, are changing the transportation and logistics of the global supply chain.”

Outrider said its patents for autonomous trailer movement complement its integration with warehouse, yard, and transportation management systems. In the second half of 2024, the company plans to begin shipping its commercial system to top Fortune 500 customers.

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InOrbit has joined the Open Source Robotics Alliance to support community software development. | Source: InOrbit

InOrbit Inc. this month joined the Open Source Robotics Alliance, or OSRA. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company said it is a milestone in its commitment to fostering collaboration and innovation within the robotics community.

“Having members like InOrbit is crucial to us because it’s an indicator of support from long-standing community members for our vision for the future of the ROS ecosystem,” stated Vanessa Yamzon Orsi, CEO of the Open Source Robotics Foundation (OSRF). She referred to the Robot Operating System. 

The OSRF last month launched the OSRA as an alliance of companies aimed at strengthening the governance of open-source robotics software projects. The OSRA said it has a mixed-membership, meritocratic model inspired by organizations such as the Linux Foundation. 

The OSRA invites community stakeholders to participate in the oversight, direction, development, and support of key open-source projects, including ROS, Gazebo, Open-RMF, and their infrastructure.

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OSRA supports shared goal of industry collaboration

By joining the OSRA, InOrbit said it is reaffirming its commitment to advancing open-source projects and promoting collaborative innovation in the robotics industry.

“The open-source community has enabled great advancements in the development and deployment of robotics solutions in the past 15 years,” said Julian Cerruti, co-founder and chief technology officer of InOrbit. “As the robotics industry grows, it’s increasingly important to create the space and organize ourselves properly to support a consensus-based advancement of these technologies that multiple companies depend on.”

“At InOrbit, we greatly appreciate the work that OSRF has done over the years to support and promote this effort and are happy to lend our support by sponsoring and participating in this initiative,” he added about the OSRA.

InOrbit said its cloud platform enables efficient robot operations (RobOps) and provides observability through secure, real-time analytics and data collection, robot performance monitoring, incident response, and root-cause analysis.

Open-source is key to interoperability, says InOrbit

InOrbit said it has been working with open initiatives since its inception, supporting ROS and ROS 2, among others. The company said this supports its approach to interoperability.

As the landscape changes for mobile robot makers and users, interoperability is becoming a concern, noted InOrbit. The company said that as robot fleets grow, and organizations add more automation to work alongside or with existing systems, they need a new level of orchestration. 

InOrbit said interoperability as key to realizing more complex tasks and safely managing interactions with human collaborators and other robots in a given space. This need goes beyond traditional fleet management, it claimed.

The company added that it is a driving factor behind its ongoing support for emerging interoperability standards and tools like the Open Robotics Middleware Framework (Open-RMF). 

Last year, InOrbit announced the availability of the open-source InOrbit RMF Fleet Adaptor. The adaptor is available on GitHub and was created with Ekumen Labs, another OSRA member.

As a silver members of the OSRA, InOrbit said it expects to contribute to shaping the future of robotics and to exploring opportunities for advancing RobOps with the alliance.

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UR cobots at the Peugeot assembly plant in France. | Source: Teradyne

My LinkedIn inbox has been busier than usual over the last couple of weeks, since I shared an opinion piece in Forbes titled “The Reinvention of the Manufacturing Industry,” exploring how a new generation of advanced robotics is helping to democratize manufacturing, making robots affordable for companies of all sizes.

Several of my professional contacts have reached out to ask: Are collaborative robots really just for small and medium-sized companies then? We know this is not true, and so I need to offer some further explanation.

Since the inception of mechanization and mass-production processes at the start of the last century, the tools large manufacturers have used to drive competitiveness and efficiency have been geared towards using size as an advantage — economies of scale, large industrial robots for high-volume low-mix tasks, large budgets to fund efficiency programs like lean and six sigma, and the ability to outsource labor at scale to anywhere with ease.

However, these levers designed for big companies didn’t work for smaller businesses. That’s why “new age” robotics, led by collaborative robots and autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), has been a game changer for many small to midsize enterprises. But it’s not where the cobot story ends. Or ironically, even began.

For the large manufacturers, competitive pressure drove need for differentiation, which increased product variations. You can feel that on every one of their assembly lines today.

But several large manufacturers are still stuck with the old tools designed for low-mix, high-volume manufacturing in this new reality, where each of their factories and warehouses have increasingly high-mix and smaller batch sizes. Manufacturers are increasingly using advanced technologies like cobots and AMRs to make their operations nimbler and more flexible while speeding up time to market.

The origin of the cobot

Few people today realize that collaborative robots were first designed with large companies in mind.

The founders of Universal Robots (UR) examined businesses already using industrial robots and set themselves the challenge of creating something that was more easily reprogrammable for different functions across factory floors. With the competition that manufacturers face today, the need for product variations for differentiation matters greatly That feeling is palpable when I walk their assembly line.

The solution that UR came up with? The world’s first commercially viable cobot – a child of two separate university research projects.

The first project sought to create a toy robot so easy to program that a child could do it in half an hour.

The second project focused on the needs of the food industry in Denmark, which at the time was looking for a more flexible approach to automation that would allow factory employees to reconfigure production lines to accommodate new products. Engineers that tried to build that flexibility into traditional industrial robots got nowhere – it was simply impossible for workers on the factory floor to learn how to reprogram the technology that existed.

The above projects came together, and the rest, as they say, is history. The result was an easily programable, highly versatile robot.

The use of cobots in large organizations today

The global market for collaborative robots was expected to hit $1.6 billion at the end of 2023, with a compound annual growth rate of 26% to 2026, as predicted by Research and Markets. It attributed this increase to a rise in smart factories and growing demand in the Asia-Pacific region.

While it’s true that cobots are democratizing robotics, they have always been of great use to large companies. But I believe that large manufacturers are yet to fully embrace the capabilities they offer.

Solid economic drivers for increased uptake are present, including labor and skills shortages, as recent research suggests large companies have the tallest hill to climb when it comes to employee retention.

It’s no wonder that many large companies – including major global corporations like Siemens, Toyota, and Novo Nordisk – have fully integrated cobot technology to make their operations more nimble.

The time has now come for the industry to do this across the board. In a competitive world, large companies have no choice but to increase agility at every turn. Slow down, and they risk falling foul to more nimble competition.

New-age robotics offers greater efficiency and speed to market, and enterprises need to board this train today or risk getting left behind on the platform.

The integration of cobots and industrial automation

Here too, it’s really exciting to witness how collaborative robots are now working with traditional industrial robots.

Retrofitting a production line with cobots tends to be fairly straightforward, partly because of the system’s small footprint. Deeper integration between cobots and traditional industrial robots is also now often possible through the programmable logic controller (PLC).

But so much more can be done. The potential opportunities awaiting large players in 2024 are colossal, and I can’t wait to see more embracing an all-encompassing automation process in manufacturing, positioning cobots to increase productivity, product quality, and safety.

Looking to the future: AI-enabled cobots and more sophisticated applications

As machine learning and AI-enabled cobot applications become more widely available, larger businesses are perfectly positioned to leverage this cutting-edge tech to support their complex and sophisticated business needs. From quality inspection using computer vision to handling high-mix applications on the production floor, I see companies using cobots to improve costs and enhance customer satisfaction.

Cobots have become user-friendly enough for even the smallest businesses, helping to democratize manufacturing. But they are also being paired with some of the world’s most sophisticated technologies, supporting global-scale companies in becoming more productive than ever.

About the author

Ujjwal Kumar is group president of Teradyne Robotics. Over his 25-plus-year career, Kumar has successfully scaled businesses at major multinationals including General Motors, General Electric, and Honeywell.

Kumar will be giving a keynote presentation at the Robotics Summit & Expo next week. In it, he will share some lessons he has learned and how they can be applied to accelerate the transformation of industry with robotics. Registration is now open for the event, which will be on May 1 and 2 at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center.

Learn from Agility Robotics, Amazon, Disney, Teradyne and many more.

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Magna International will manufacture more delivery robots. Source: Serve Robotics

Serve Robotics Inc. today said it has expanded its existing partnership with Magna International Inc. to increase production of Serve’s sidewalk delivery robots. Under the terms of the new production and purchase agreement, Magna is the exclusive contract manufacturer of Serve’s autonomous systems, supporting its plan to deploy up to 2,000 robots on the Uber Eats platform across multiple U.S. markets.

“Magna is excited to continue collaborating with Serve, leveraging our manufacturing and technical expertise to help fuel Serve’s growth potential,” stated Matteo Del Sorbo, executive vice president for New Mobility globally at Magna.

Aurora, Ontario-based Magna is one of the world’s largest automotive suppliers. The new agreement extends a previously disclosed agreement effective Feb. 20, under which Serve granted the company a non-exclusive license to its technologies and expertise, enabling Magna to further develop new products in the robotics and logistics space.

Serve Robotics builds on IPO

The announcement came less than a week after Serve Robotics went public, raising $40 million.

“Serve is a leader in creating robots that navigate complex human environments,” said Ali Kashani, CEO of Serve Robotics. “Following our successful public offering, we are excited to start working to scale our robotic fleet with Magna’s world-class manufacturing capabilities.”

“This collaboration supports the natural progression of our business beyond food delivery and positions our proprietary robotics technology as a platform upon which new robots can be built,” he added. “Magna is a valuable partner in this effort.”

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Investors, customers fuel delivery robot rollout

Redwood City, Calif.-based Serve Robotics spun out of Uber Technologies Inc. in 2021. The company claimed that its low-emissions robots using artificial intelligence for Level 4 autonomy will make delivery more sustainable and economical. It has backing from NVIDIA and Uber subsidiary Postmates, among others.

Since 2022, Serve said it has completed thousands of deliveries for customers including Walmart, 7-Eleven, and Uber Eats. The company offers its mobile robots through a robots-as-a-service (RaaS) model.

The global market for robotic last-mile delivery could grow from $70 million in 2022 to $670 million by 2030, predicted ABI Research. It attributed this expansion to labor and vehicle costs, improving autonomy technologies, inflation, and consumer expectations of rapid service.

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