The U.S. National Robotics Roadmap was first created 10 years ago. Since then, government agencies, universities, and companies have used it as a reference for where robotics is going. The first roadmap was published in 2009 and then revised in 2013 and 2016. The objective is to publish the fourth version of the roadmap by summer 2020.
The team developing the U.S. National Robotics Roadmap has put out a call to engage about 150 to 200 people from academia and industry to ensure that it is representative of the robotics community’s view of the future. The roadmap will cover manufacturing, service, medical, first-responder, and space robotics.
The revised roadmap will also include considerations related to ethics and workforce. It will cover emerging applications, the key challenges to progress, and what research and development is needed.
Join community workshops
Three one-and-a-half-day workshops will be organized for community input to the roadmap. The workshops will take place as follows:
Sept. 11-12 in Chicago (organized by Nancy Amato, co-director of the Parasol Lab at Texas A&M University and head of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Ilinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Oct. 17-18 in Los Angeles (organized by Maja Mataric, Chan Soon-Shiong distinguished professor of computer science, neuroscience, and pediatrics at the University of Southern California)
Nov. 15-16 in Lowell, Mass. (organized by Holly Yanco, director of the NERVE Center at the University of Massachusetts Lowell)
Participation in these workshops will be by invitation only. To participate, please submit a white paper/position statement of a maximum length of 1.5 pages. What are key use cases for robotics in a five-to-10-year perspective, what are key limitations, and what R&D is needed in that time frame? The white paper can address all three aspects or focus on one of them. The white paper must include the following information:
Name, affiliation, and e-mail address
A position statement (1.5 pages max)
Please submit the white paper as regular text or as a PDF file. Statements that are too long will be ignored. Position papers that only focus on current research are not appropriate. A white paper should present a future vision and not merely discuss state of the art.
White papers should be submitted by end of the day Aug. 15, 2019, to roadmapping@robotics-vo.org. Late submissions may not be considered. We will evaluate submitted white papers by Aug. 18 and select people for the workshops by Aug. 19.
Roadmap revision timeline
The workshop reports will be used as the basis for a synthesis of a new roadmap. The nominal timeline is:
August 2019: Call for white papers
September – November 2019: Workshops
December 2019: Workshops reports finalized
January 2020: Synthesis meeting at UC San Diego
February 2020: Publish draft roadmap for community feedback
April 2020: Revision of roadmap based on community feedback
May 2020: Finalize roadmap with graphics design
July 2020: Publish roadmap
If you have any questions about the process, the scope, etc., please send e-mail to Henrik I Christensen at hichristensen@eng.ucsd.edu.
Henrik I Christensen spoke at the Robotics Summit & Expo in Boston.
PneuConnect with GRT gripper on a UR cobot. Source: PHD
PHD Inc. this month added three products to its line of grippers and accessories for industrial automation. They are intended to help robots grip large objects, make positioning and programming easy for maximum efficiency, and facilitate machine tending. PHD’s products are designed to work with collaborative robot arms, or cobots, from Universal Robots A/S.
Fort Wayne, In.-based PHD said it sells grippers, linear slides, and the widest range of long-life, robust actuators in the industry. It also offers engineering software and Internet-based tools to save design time, support from factory-trained application and industry specialists, and rapid product delivery.
PHD adds jaw-travel option to GRR line
The company has added a 300mm (11.81 in.) jaw-travel model of its Series GRR high-capacity pneumatic grippers. These parallel grippers are designed to provide high grip force, five long-jaw travels, and high loads.
Because the Guardian grippers can withstand high impact and shock loads, they are suitable for applications such as small engine block manufacturing, automotive wheel-rim manufacturing, and foundry applications, said PHD.
Also available is the Series EGRR high-capacity electric parallel grippers, which offer many of the same benefits as the pneumatic design.
Pneu-Connect X2 with dual grippers available
PHD also announced the release of Pneu-Connext X2 kits with dual grippers. They can be mounted to UR cobots for maximum efficiency in automation performance.
The Pneu-Connect X2 includes PHD’s Freedrive feature, which interfaces with UR cobots for easy positioning and programming. The kits come in the following standard combinations:
Transition plates connect UR directly to linear actuator
PHD’s transition plate allows a Universal Robot arm to be directly attached to the new PHD Series ESU electric belt-driven linear actuator. The company said it offers a transition plate for each size of UR arm, “taking machine tending to a whole new level.”
This transition plate provides a seventh axis for UR arms with the ESU linear actuator. Source: PHD
With a cataloged stroke of up to 5500mm (216.53 in.), users can increase the working area of a UR10 arm by 10 times.
Among the challenges for developers of mobile manipulation and humanoid robots is the need for an affordable and flexible research platform. PAL Robotics last month announced its TIAGo++, a robot that includes two arms with seven degrees of freedom each.
As with PAL Robotics‘ one-armed TIAGo, the new model is based on the Robot Operating System (ROS) and can be expanded with additional sensors and end effectors. TIAGo++ is intended to enable engineers to create applications that include a touchscreen interface for human-robot interaction (HRI) and require simultaneous perception, bilateral manipulation, mobility, and artificial intelligence.
Jordi Pagès, product manager of the TIAGo robot at PAL Robotics responded to the following questions about TIAGo++ from The Robot Report:
For the development of TIAGo++, how did you collect feedback from the robotics community?
Pagès: PAL Robotics has a long history in research and development. We have been creating service robotics platforms since 2004. When we started thinking about the TIAGo robot development, we asked researchers from academia and industry which features would they expect or value in a platform for research.
Our goal with TIAGo has always been the same: to deliver a robust platform for research that easily adapts to diverse robotics projects and use cases. That’s why it was key to be in touch with the robotics and AI developers from start.
After delivering the robots, we usually ask for feedback and stay in touch with the research centers to learn about their activities and experiences, and the possible improvements or suggestions they would have. We do the same with the teams that use TIAGo for competitions like RoboCup or the European Robotics League [ERL].
At the same time, TIAGo is used in diverse European-funded projects where end users from different sectors, from healthcare to industry, are involved. This allows us to also learn from their feedback and keep finding new ways in which the platform could be of help in a user-centered way. That’s how we knew that adding a second arm into the TIAGo portfolio of its modular possibilities could be of help to the robotics community.
How long did it take PAL Robotics to develop the two-armed TIAGo++ in comparison with the original model?
Pagès: Our TIAGo platform is very modular and robust, so it took us just few months from taking the decision to having a working TIAGo++ ready to go. The modularity of all our robots and our wide experience developing humanoids usually helps us a lot in reducing the redesign and production time.
The software is also very modular, with extensive use of ROS, the de facto standard robotics middleware. Our customers are able to upgrade, modify, and substitute ROS packages. That way, they can focus their attention on their real research on perception, navigation, manipulation, HRI, and AI.
How high can TIAGo++ go, and what’s its reach?
Pagès: TIAGo++ can reach the floor and up to 1.75m [5.74 ft.] high with each arm, thanks to the combination of its 7 DoF [seven degrees of freedom] arms and its lifting torso. The maximum extension of each arm is 92cm [36.2 in.]. In our experience, this workspace allows TIAGo to work in several environments like domestic, healthcare, and industry.
The TIAGo can extend in height, and each arm has a reach of about 3 ft. Source: PAL Robotics
What’s the advantage of seven degrees of freedom for TIAGo’s arms over six degrees?
Pagès: A 7-DoF arm is much better in this sense for people who will be doing manipulation tasks. Adding more DoFs means that the robot can arrive to more poses — positions and orientations — of its arm and end-effector that it couldn’t reach before.
Also, this enables developers to reduce singularities, avoiding non-desired abrupt movements. This means that TIAGo has more possibilities to move its arm and reach a certain pose in space, with a more optimal combination of movements.
What sensors and motors are in the robot? Are they off-the-shelf or custom?
Pagès: All our mobile-based platforms, like the TIAGo robot, combine many sensors. TIAGo has a laser and sonars to move around and localize itself in space, an IMU [inertial measurement unit], and an RGB-D camera in the head. It can have a force/torque sensor on the wrist, especially useful to work in HRI scenarios. It also has a microphone and a speaker.
TIAGo has current sensing in every joint of the arm, enabling a very soft, effortless torque control on each of the arms. The possibility of having an expansion panel with diverse connectors makes it really easy for developers to add even more sensors to it, like a thermal camera or a gripper camera, once they have TIAGo in their labs.
About the motors, TIAGo++ makes use our custom joints integrating high-quality commercial components and our own electronic power management and control. All motors also have encoders to measure the current motor position.
What’s the biggest challenge that a humanoid like TIAGo++ can help with?
Pagès: TIAGo++ can help with are those tasks that require bi-manipulation, in combination with navigation, perception, HRI, or AI. Even though it is true that a one-arm robot can already perform a wide range of tasks, there are many actions in our daily life that require of two arms, or that are more comfortably or quickly done with two arms rather than one.
For example, two arms are good for grasping and carrying a box, carrying a platter, serving liquids, opening a bottle or a jar, folding clothes, or opening a wardrobe while holding an object. In the end, our world and tools have been designed for the average human body, which is with two arms, so TIAGo++ can adapt to that.
As a research platform based on ROS, is there anything that isn’t open-source? Are navigation and manipulation built in or modular?
Pagès: Most software is provided either open-sourced or with headers and dynamic libraries so that customers can develop applications making use of the given APIs or using the corresponding ROS interfaces at runtime.
For example, all the controllers in TIAGo++ are plugins of ros_control, so customers can implement their own controllers following our public tutorials and deploy them on the real robot or in the simulation.
Moreover, users can replace any ROS package by their own packages. This approach is very modular, and even if we provide navigation and manipulation built-in, developers can use their own navigation and manipulation instead of ours.
Did PAL work with NVIDIA on design and interoperability, or is that an example of the flexibility of ROS?
Pagès: It is both an example of how easy is to expand TIAGo with external devices and how easy is to integrate in ROS these devices.
One example of applications that our clients have developed using the NVIDIA Jetson TX2 is the “Bring me a beer” task from the Homer Team [at RoboCup], at the University of Koblenz-Landau. They made a complete application in which TIAGo robot could understand a natural language request, navigate autonomously to the kitchen, open the fridge, recognize and select the requested beer, grasp it, and deliver it back to the person who asked for it.
As a company, we work with multiple partners, but we also believe that our users should be able to have a flexible platform that allows them to easily integrate off-the-shelf solutions they already have.
How much software support is there for human-machine interaction via a touchscreen?
Pagès: The idea behind integrating a touchscreen on TIAGo++ is to bring customers the possibility to implement their own graphical interface, so we provide full access to the device. We work intensively with researchers, and we provide platforms as open as our customers need, such as a haptic interface.
What do robotics developers need to know about safety and security?
Pagès: A list of safety measures and best practices are provided in the Handbook of TIAGo robot in order that customers ensure safety both around the robot and for the robot itself.
TIAGo also features some implicit control modes that help to ensure safety while operation. For example, an effort control mode for the arms is provided so that collisions can be detected and the arm can be set in gravity compensation mode.
Furthermore, the wrist can include a six-axis force/torque sensor providing more accurate feedback about collisions or interactions of the end effector with the environment. This sensor can be also used to increase the safety of the robot. We provide this information to our customers and developers so they are always aware about the safety measures.
Have any TIAGo users moved toward commercialization based on what they’ve learned with PAL’s systems?
Pagès: At the moment, from the TIAGo family, we commercialize the TIAGo Base for intralogistics automation in indoor spaces such as factories or warehouses.
Some configurations of the TIAGo robot have been tested in pilots in healthcare applications. In the EnrichMe H2020 EU Project, the robot gave assistance to old people at home autonomously for up to approximately two months.
In robotics competitions such as the ERL, teams have shown the quite outstanding performance of TIAGo in accomplishing specific actions in a domestic environment. Two teams ended first and third in the RoboCup@Home OPL 2019 in Sydney, Australia. The Homer Team won for the third time in a row using TIAGo — see it clean a toilet here.
The CATIE Robotics Team ended up third in the first world championship in which it participated. For instance, in one task, it took out the trash.
The TIAGo robot is also used for European Union Horizon 2020 experiments in which collaborative robots that combine mobility with manipulation are used in industrial scenarios. This includes projects such as MEMMO for motion generation, Co4Robots for coordination, and RobMoSys for open-source software development.
Besides this research aspect, we have industrial customers that are using TIAGo to improve their manufacturing procedures.
Pagès: With TIAGo++, besides the platform itself, you also get support, extra advanced software solutions, and assessment from a company that continues to be in the robotics sector since more than 15 years ago. Robots like the TIAGo++ also use our know-how both in software and hardware, a knowledge that the team has been gathering from the development of cutting-edge biped humanoids like the torque-controlled TALOS.
From a technical point of view, TIAGo++ was made very compact to suit environments shared with people such as homes. Baxter was a very nice entry-point platform and was not originally designed to be a mobile manipulator but a fixed one. TIAGo++ can use the same navigation used in our commercial autonomous mobile robot for intralogistics tasks, the TIAGo Base.
Besides, TIAGo++ is a fully customizable robot in all aspects: You can select the options you want in hardware and software, so you get the ideal platform you want to have in your robotics lab. For a mobile manipulator with two 7-DoF arms, force/torque sensors, ROS-based, affordable, and with community support, we believe TIAGo++ should be a very good option.
The TIAGo community is growing around the world, and we are sure that we will see more and more robots helping people in different scenarios very soon.
What’s the price point for TIAGo++?
Pagès: The starting price is around €90,000 [$100,370 U.S.]. It really depends on the configuration, devices, computer power, sensors, and extras that each client can choose for their TIAGo robot, so the price can vary.
Smart manufacturing investments. Source: GP Bullhound
Continuing improvements in software and hardware are leading to trends such as Manufacturing-as-a-Service, hyper-personalization of products on demand, and a reinvention of the capital goods economy, found a new study. Last month, GP Bullhound issued a new report titled “Smart Manufacturing: The Rise of the Machines.”
The report provided a global, in-depth look at how smart manufacturing gained momentum between 2013 and 2018. It also drew conclusions about the potential future for manufacturing in terms of growth, investment, and the value of data. With robotics still largely serving manufacturing, engineers can get a glimpse of trends for which to prepare.
GP Bullhound reviewed the value of smart manufacturing transactions. China and Japan have led in smart manufacturing, with a market value of $28 billion, according to the technology advisory and investment firm. Europe followed with $24 billion, and the U.S. lagged at $20 billion.
The report found 1,300 venture capital transactions worldwide, worth a total of $17.4 billion. The U.S. led in investments, with American startups receiving $11.4 billion, compared with $3.9 billion in Asia and $2.1 billion in Europe. GP Bullhound also found $37.7 billion in mergers and acquisitions during the five-year period.
Sources: Pitchbook, Capital IQ, company websites, press releases, GP Bullhound
In addition, the report noted that data is growing in value, despite debates over how and whether production should be automated.
Dr. Nikolas Westphal, director at GP Bullhound, answered several questions from The Robot Report about the study’s findings:
Whether we call it “smart manufacturing,” “Industry 4.0,” or something else, the combination of machine learning, big data, the Internet of Things (IoT), and robotics is arriving, according to your report. But how ready are most companies — especially those outside the electronics and automotive verticals — for it?
Westphal: Smart manufacturing readiness is something that we discussed with several of our interview partners, including interviewees from leading European software houses and IoT platforms.
The current state seems to be that most OEMs are substantially increasing the density of IoT devices within their equipment in order to make it “smart” and are also working on the required digital platforms. As “smart” equipment proliferates, more and more manufacturing operators of all sizes will start to increasingly use methodologies of smart manufacturing.
Source: GP Bullhound
When it comes to digitization by industry, our research indeed indicates that electronics and automotive are furthest down the line on the journey to end-to-end digitization. In general, I would say that today, industries with the highest scale effects are also the most automated. With the emergence of smaller, more flexible robotic equipment — such as collaborative robots, additive manufacturing, and data-driven factory design — we believe that also smaller players will be able to reap the rewards of smart automation.
Some of the companies featured in our report actually address this challenge for companies of all sizes. One example for this is Oden Technologies, which is featured in Section 2 of our report.
Investments in robotics and startups have slowed in the past quarter, but do you think that’s temporary and why?
Westphal: Quarterly VC funding data is notoriously hard to interpret, as it follows transaction cycles. Applying our search criteria for smart manufacturing startups, global VC funding in smart manufacturing in Q1 2019 has stood at €1.02 billion ($1.14 billion U.S.) across 73 deals versus €1.07 billion ($1.2 billion U.S.) in Q4 2018 [Source: Pitchbook]. As there is somewhat of a reporting lag, I expect the Q1 2019 figure to be gradually adjusted upward throughout the year.
Source: GP Bullhound
How might a cyclical economic recession affect spending on industrial automation and smart manufacturing?
Westphal: I believe that a recession may not necessarily long-term impact investments into industrial automation specifically. While replacement cycles may somewhat slow, efficiency will be increasingly important in a recession situation.
The section on productivity gains from smart manufacturing cites Volvo as an example. How is Volvo’s use of robots part of a technology cluster?
Westphal: The tables and the case studies were supplied by our feature partner Accenture. On the left-hand side of both Figure 1 and 2, you can see the different relevant technologies, on the right-hand side different industry verticals. The percentages indicate the incremental cost savings per employee in Figure 1 as well as the projected implied additional gains in market capitalization in Figure 2.
For example, in automotive, autonomous robots and AI seem to have the biggest impact, in addition to 3D printing, blockchain, and big data. Overall, Accenture believes that the combinatory effect of these technologies will add up to incremental cost savings per employee of 13.9% for automotive.
How much is simulation software being applied to the design and implementation of robotics? How far are we from “lights-out” manufacturing?
Westphal: This question is addressed to some extent by the feature of Brian Mathews of Bright Machines. Once the computer vision and control challenges have been addressed, lights out manufacturing should become a reality.
Source: GP Bullhound
Several robotics vendors have told us that they want to “keep humans in the loop,” so what sorts of processes are better for collaboration vs. full autonomy with “software-defined” manufacturing?
Westphal: From our interviews on the topic, it seems to me that high-volume, repetitive, but complex processes that require a high degree of accuracy are well-suited for full autonomy, while processes that require a high degree of versatility are better suited for collaboration.
Westphal: The Teradyne-Universal Robots deal is featured on p. 33. Honeywell/Intelligrated is part of our database but not featured in the selected landmark transactions. We have not only selected those by size, but also other criteria like sector fit and visibility.
The creation of OnRobot is not shown in Section 3 as we weren’t able to find publicly available data on funding amount. OnRobot itself is featured as a notable company on p. 63 of the report.
Will trade tensions between the West and China slow the trend to cross-border consolidation?
Westphal: It seems that Chinese outbound investment is really geared towards utilizing technologies in China’s huge manufacturing sector. Especially as Europe does not seem to engage in restrictive trade policies with China (yet), I would expect this trend to continue.
Cross-border deals. Source: GP Bullhound
Since GP Bullhound is watching investments in hardware and the software stack around smart manufacturing, has it identified any strategic leaders?
Westphal: We don’t provide investment advice. A selection of companies that we find interesting can be found on p. 62 and 63 of the report.
Toolcraft Inc., a small precision machining shop in Seattle, makes parts for industries including aerospace, defense, and medical. It needed help tending its CNC machine and ultimately turned to Universal Robots A/S’s e-Series collaborative robots.
Faced with labor shortages and a demanding manufacturing task, Toolcraft assessed its alternatives and worked with an integrator to apply a UR5e cobot to its process.
Challenge
Toolcraft needed to automate a three-step task to keep up with production demands, especially when a large medical device required it to add a third shift for round-the-clock operations. Finding workers is difficult in a region with 3% unemployment.
“Nobody wants to run on third shift around here,” said Steve Wittenberg, director of operations at Toolcraft. “When you put an ad out, you’re not getting very many responses.”
The company initially looked at traditional industrial robots but realized that it would have to add costly safety infrastructure.
“If we looked at just the robot hardware alone, that appeared to be a more cost-effective solution,” Wittenberg said. “But once we started factoring in the savings on not having to erect a safety cage – and the time saved on the ease of use, avoiding a lot of complex programming – Universal Robots ended up being the right solution.”
Solution
Toolcraft discussed its need for loading a medical device part into a CNC machine for multi-threading with Rapid Design Solutions, a certified systems integrator for UR cobots.
“When we heard that the repeatability of the UR5e was down to 30 microns, we were very excited,” said Troy Ojalehto, owner of Rapid Design Solutions. “That really competes in the same space as traditional industrial robots, so that was huge for us. I have not seen other cobots handling this level of precision with multi-op parts like this, with raw stock going in and completed precision parts coming out.”
Thanks to its force-feedback feature, the UR5e is able to make the part fit tightly in the CNC fixturing. “Using the force motion with freedom in the X,Y and rotational Z axes, we can force the part in there, and wiggle it, and program that compliance very easily to enable basically a human touch with the robot,” he said.
The UR+ program, which certifies that accessories such as grippers, vision systems, and software will work with UR cobots, helped speed up integration.
“For this application, we chose a Pneu-Connect pneumatic gripper,” said Ojalehtos. “A big factor is that it’s UR+ certified, which means it works with Universal right out of the box, with all gripper software integrated directly on the UR teach pendant, eliminating the need to do any script coding.”
Toolcraft chose the UR+ certified PneuConnect gripper, which works seamlessly with UR’s teach pendant. Source: Universal Robotics
Results at Toolcraft
“Some of the benefits we’ve seen right off were a significant production increase,” said Wittenberg. “We were able to staff that third shift and went from producing 255 parts a week to 370 parts per week. Along with that, we’re able to finish our year’s production seven weeks sooner, thus freeing up that machine to produce parts on other jobs.”
After six months, Toolcraft saw costs decline by 23%, and it now expects a return on investment on the cobot arm at about 12 months.
“We’re going to be able to be more competitive on a lot of the long-term work that we have,” Wittenberg said.
Since the UR5e cobot only tends parts for six minutes out of a 56-minute cycle, a Toolcraft engineer added a part rinsing and cleaning station after using Universal Robots‘ online training.
“After our automation engineer took the online UR Academy, he spent a few hours with the integrator and was able to add that station to the cobot cycle with no external help otherwise,” said Wittenberg. Universal Robots’ simulator also allowed Toolcraft to program most of the additional tasks without taking the cobot offline.
After certified systems integrator Troy Ojalehto (right) developed the initial application, Toolcraft automation engineer Brian Laulainen (left) was able to handle daily operations and build add-ons for the UR5e after training through the UR Academy. Source: Universal Robots
In addition, the company was easily able to use Universal Robots‘ I/O interfaces to control the pneumatic fixture and door actuators. “This greatly reduces the need for CNC wiring and preserves all the CNC’s standard safety functions,” Ojalehto said.
The installation has been so successful that Toolcraft is planning to install one cobot every year. “The fact that our own automation engineer is now able to go in and troubleshoot anything that comes up is going to be key in us meeting this goal,” Wittenberg said.
Toolcraft plans to automate tending a horizontal mill next. “That’s a potential challenge because of the mills using rotary tombstones that are swapped in and out of the milling machine, which creates some difficulties with fixturing,” said Wittenberg. “But we’re confident we can solve those using a Universal Robot and some innovation in fixturing.”
Small and midsize enterprises are just beginning to benefit from collaborative robot arms or cobots, which are intended to be safer and easier to use than their industrial cousins. However, high costs and the difficulty of customization are still barriers to adoption. Elephant Robotics this week announced its Catbot, which it described as an “all in one safe robotic assistant.”
The cobot has six degrees of freedom, has a 600mm (23.6 in.) reach, and weighs 18kg (39.68 lb.). It has a payload capacity of 5kg (11 lb.). Elephant Robotics tested Catbot in accordance with international safety standards EN ISO 13848:2008 PL d and 10218-1: 2011-Clause 5.4.3 for human-machine interaction. A teach pendant and a power box are optional with Catbot.
Elephant Robotics CEO Joey Song studied in Australia. Upon returning home, he said, he “wanted to create a smaller in size robot that will be safe to operate and easy to program for any business owner with just a few keystrokes.”
Song founded Elephant Robotics in 2016 in Shenzhen, China, also known as “the Silicon Valley of Asia.” It joined the HAX incubator and received seed funding from Princeton, N.J.-based venture capital firm SOSV.
Song stated that he is committed in making human-robot collaboration accessible to any small business by eliminating the limitations of high price or requirements for highly skilled programming. Elephant Robotics also makes the Elephant and Panda series cobots for precise industrial automation.
Catbot includes voice controls
Repetitive tasks can lead to boredom, accidents, and poor productivity and quality, noted Elephant Robotics. Its cobots are intended to free human workers to be more creative. The company added that Catbot can save on costs and increase workloads.
Controlling robots, even collaborative robots, can be difficult. This is even harder for robots that need to be precise and safe. Elephant Robotics cited Facebook’s new PyRobot framework as an example of efforts to simplify robotic commands.
Catbot is built on an open platform so developers can share the skills they’ve developed, allowing others to use them or build on top of them.
Elephant Robotics claimed that it has made Catbot smarter and safer than other collaborative robots, offering “high efficiency and flexibility to various industries.” It includes force sensing and voice-command functions.
In addition, Catbot has an “all-in-one” design, cloud-based programming, and quick tool changing.
The catStore virtual shop offers a set of 20 basic skills. Elephant Robotics said that new skills could be developed for specific businesses, and they can be shared with other users on its open platform.
Catbot is designed to provide automated assistance to people in a variety of SMEs. Source: Elephant Robotics
Application areas
Elephant Robotics said its cobots are suitable for assembly, packaging, pick-and-place, and testing tasks, among others. Its arms work with a variety of end effectors. To increase its flexibility, the company said, Catbot is designed to be easy to program, from high-precision tasks to covering “hefty ground projects.”
According to Elephant Robotics, the Catbot can used for painting, photography, and giving massages. It could also be a personal barista or play with humans in a table game. In addition, Catbot could act as a helping hand in research workshops or as an automatic screwdriver, said the company.
Elephant Robotics’ site said it serves the agricultural and food, automotive, consumer electronics, educational and research, household device, and machining markets.
Catbot is available now for preorder, with deliveries set to start in August 2019. Contact Elephant Robotics for more information on price or tech specifications atsales@elephantrobotics.com.
Fleets of autonomous mobile robots have been growing in warehouses and the service industry. Singapore-based Techmetics has entered the U.S. market with ambitions to supply multiple markets, which it already does overseas.
The company last month launched two new lines of autonomous mobile robots. The Techi Butler is designed to serve hotel guests or hospital patients by interacting with them via a touchscreen or smartphone. It can deliver packages, room-service orders, and linens and towels.
The Techi Cart is intended to serve back-of-house services such as laundry rooms, kitchens, and housekeeping departments.
“Techmetics serves 10 different applications, including manufacturing, casinos, and small and midsize businesses,” said Mathan Muthupillai, founder and CEO of Techmetics. “We’re starting with just two in the U.S. — hospitality and healthcare.”
Building a base
Muthupillai founded Techmetics in Singapore in 2012. “We spent the first three years on research and development,” he told The Robot Report. “By the end of 2014, we started sending out solutions.”
“The R&D team didn’t just start with product development,” recalled Muthupillai. “We started with finding clients first, identified their pain points and expectations, and got feedback on what they needed.”
“A lot of other companies make a robotic base, but then they have to build a payload solution,” he said. “We started with a good robot base that we found and added our body, software layer, and interfaces. We didn’t want to build autonomous navigation from scratch.”
“Now, we’re just getting components — lasers, sensors, motors — and building everything ourselves,” he explained. “The navigation and flow-management software are created in-house. We’ve created our own proprietary software.”
“We have a range of products, all of which use 2-D SLAM [simultaneous localization and mapping], autonomous navigation, and many safety sensors,” Muthupillai added. “They come with three lasers — two vertical and one horizontal for path planning. We’re working on a 3-D-based navigation solution.”
“Our robots are based on ROS [the Robot Operating System],” said Muthupillai. “We’ve created a unique solution that comes with third-party interfaces.”
Source: Techmetics
Techmetics payloads vary
The payload capacity of Techmetics’ robots depends on the application and accessories and ranges from 250 to 550 lb. (120 to 250 kg).
“The payload and software are based on the behavior patterns in an industry,” said Muthupillai. “In manufacturing or warehousing, people are used to working around robots, but in the service sector, there are new people all the time. The robot must respond to them — they may stay in its path or try to stop it.”
“When we started this company, there were few mobile robots for the manufacturing industry. They looked industrial and had relatively few safety features because they weren’t near people,” he said. “We changed the form factor for hospitality to be good-looking and safer.”
“When we talk with hotels about the Butler robots, they needed something that could go to multiple rooms,” Muthupillai explained. “Usually, staffers take two to three items in a single trip, so if a robot went to only one room and then returned, that would be a waste of time. Our robots have three compartment levels based on this feedback.”
Elevators posed a challenge for the Techi Butler and Techi Cart — not just for interoperability, but also for human-machine interaction, he said.
“Again, people working with robots didn’t share elevators with robots, but in hospitals and hotels, the robot needs to complete its job alongside people,” Muthupillai said. “After three years, we’re still modifying or adding functionalities, and the robots can take an elevator or go across to different buildings.”
“We’re not currently focusing on the supply chain industry, but we will license and launch the base into the market so that third parties can create their own solutions,” he said.
Techi Cart transports linens and towels in a hotel or hospital. Source: Techmetics
Differentiators for Techi Butler and Cart
“We provide 10 robot models for four industries — no single company is a competitor for all our markets,” said Muthupillai. “We have three key differentiators.”
“First, customers can engage one vendor for multiple needs, and all of our robots can interact with one another,” he said. “Second, we talk with our clients and are always open to customization — for example, about compartment size — that other’s can’t do.”
“Third, we work across industries and can share our advantages across them,” Muthupillai claimed. “Since we already work with the healthcare industry, we already comply with safety and other regulations.”
“In hospitals or hotels, it’s not just about delivering a product from one point to another,” he said. “We’re adding camera and voice-recognition capabilities. If a robot sees a person who’s lost, it can help them.”
Techmetics’ mobile robots are manufactured in Thailand. According to Muthupillai, 80% of its robots are deployed in hotels and hospitals, and 20% are in manufacturing. The company already has distributors in Australia, Taiwan, and Thailand, and it is leveraging existing international clients for its expansion.
“We have many corporate clients in Singapore,” Muthupillai said. “The Las Vegas Sands Singapore has deployed 10 robots, and their headquarters in Las Vegas is considering deploying our products.”
“Also, U.K.-based Yotel has two hotels in Singapore, and its London branch is also interested,” he added. “The Miami Yotel is already using our robots, and soon they will be in San Francisco.”
Techmetics has three models for customers to choose from. The first is outright purchase, and the second is a two- or three-year lease. “The third model is innovative — they can try the robots from three to six months or one year and then buy,” Muthupillai said.
Muthupillai said he has moved to Techmetics’ branch office in the U.S. to manage its expansion. “We’ll be doing direct marketing in California, and we’re in the process of identifying partners, especially on the East Coast.”
“Only the theme, colors, or logos changed. No special modifications were necessary for the U.S. market,” he said. “We followed safety regulations overseas, but they were tied to U.S. regulations.”
“We will target the retail industry with a robot concierge, probably by the end of this year,” said Muthupillai. “We will eventually offer all 10 models in the U.S.”
CloudMinds was among the robotics companies receiving funding in March 2019. Source: CloudMinds
Investments in robots, autonomous vehicles, and related systems totaled at least $1.3 billion in March 2019, down from $4.3 billion in February. On the other hand, automation companies reported $7.8 billion in mergers and acquisitions last month. While that may represent a slowdown, note that many businesses did not specify the amounts involved in their transactions, of which there were at least 58 in March.
Self-driving cars and trucks — including machine learning and sensor technologies — continued to receive significant funding. Although Lyft’s initial public offering was not directly related to autonomous vehicles, it illustrates the investments flowing for transportation.
Other use cases represented in March 2019 included surgical robotics, industrial automation, and service robots. See the table below, which lists amounts in millions of dollars where they were available:
Company
Amt. (M$)
Type
Lead investor, partner, acquirer
Date
Technology
Airbiquity
15
investment
Denso Corp., Toyota Motor Corp., Toyota Tsushu Corp.
March 12, 2019
connected vehicles
AROMA BIT Inc.
2.2
Series A
Sony Innovation Fund
March 3, 2019
olofactory sensors
AtomRobot
Series B1
Y&R Capital
March 5, 2019
industrial automation
Automata
7.4
Series A
ABB
March 19, 2019
robot arm
Avidbots
23.6
Series B
True Ventures
March 21, 2019
commercial floor cleaning
Boranet
Series A
Gobi Partners
March 6, 2019
IIoT, machine vision
Broadmann17
11
Series A
OurCrowd
March 6, 2019
deep learning, autonomous vehicles
Cloudminds
300
investment
SoftBank Vision Fund
March 26, 2019
service robots
Corindus
4.8
private placement
March 12, 2019
surgical robot
Determined AI
11
Series A
GV (Google Ventures)
March 13, 2019
AI, deep learning
Emergen Group
29
Series B
Qiming Venture Partners
March 13, 2019
industrial automation
Fabu Technology
pre-Series A
Qingsong Fund
March 1, 2019
autonomous vehicles
Fortna
recapitalization
Thomas H. Lee PArtners LP
March 27, 2019
materlais handling
ForwardX
14.95
Series B
Hupang Licheng Fund
March 21, 2019
autonomous mobile robots
Gaussian Robotics
14.9
Series B
Grand Flight Investment
March 20, 2019
cleaning
Hangzhou Guochen Robot Technology
15
Series A
Hongcheng Capital, Yingshi Fund (YS Investment)
March 13, 2019
robotics R&D
Hangzhou Jimu Technology Co.
Series B
Flyfot Ventures
March 6, 2019
autonomous vehicles
InnerSpace
3.2
seed
BDC Capital's Women in Technology Fund
March 26, 2019
IoT
Innoviz Technologies
132
Series C
China Merchants Capital, Shenzhen Capital Group, New Alliance Capital
March 26, 2019
lidar
Intelligent Marking
investment
Benjamin Capital
March 6, 2019
autonomous robots for marking sports fields
Kaarta Inc.
6.5
Series A
GreenSoil Building Innovation Fund
March 21, 2019
lidar mapping
Kolmostar Inc.
10
Series A
March 5, 2019
positioning technology
Linear Labs
4.5
seed
Science Inc., Kindred Ventures
March 26, 2019
motors
MELCO Factory Automation Philippines Inc.
2.38
new division
Mitsubishi Electric Corp.
March 12, 2019
industrial automation
Monet Technologies
4.51
joint venture
Honda Motor Co., Hino Motors Ltd., SoftBank Corp., Toyota Motor Corp
Bonfire Ventures, Vertex Ventures, London Venture Partners
March 11, 2019
machine vision
Vtrus
2.9
investment
March 8, 2019
drone inspection
Weltmeister Motor
450
Series C
Baidu Inc.
March 11, 2019
self-driving cars
And here are the mergers and acquisitions:
March 2019 robotics acquisitions
Company
Amt. (M$)
Acquirer
Date
Technology
Accelerated Dynamics
Animal Dynamics
3/8/2019
AI, drone swarms
Astori AS
4Subsea
3/19/2019
undersea control systems
Brainlab
Smith & Nephew
3/12/2019
surgical robot
Figure Eight
175
Appen Ltd.
3/10/2019
AI, machine learning
Floating Point FX
CycloMedia
3/7/2019
machine vision, 3D modeling
Florida Turbine Technologies
60
Kratos Defense and Security Solutions
3/1/2019
drones
Infinity Augmented Reality
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
3/21/2019
AR, machine vision
Integrated Device Technology Inc.
6700
Renesas
3/30/2019
self-driving vehicle processors
Medineering
Brainlab
3/20/2019
surgical
Modern Robotics Inc.
0.97
Boxlight Corp.
3/14/2019
STEM
OMNI Orthopaedics Inc.
Corin Group
3/6/2019
surgical robotics
OrthoSpace Ltd.
220
Stryker Corp.
3/14/2019
surgical robotics
Osiris Therapeutics
660
Smith & Nephew
3/12/2019
surgical robotics
Restoration Robotics Inc.
21
Venus Concept Ltd.
3/15/2019
surgical robotics
Sofar Ocean Technologies
7
Spoondrift, OpenROV
3/28/2019
underwater drones, sensors
Torc Robotics Inc.
Daimler Trucks and Buses Holding Inc.
3/29/2019
driverless truck software
Surgical robots make the cut
One of the largest transactions reported in March 2019 was Smith & Nephew’s purchase of Osiris Therapeutics for $660 million. However, some Osiris shareholders are suing to block the acquisition because they believe the price that U.K.-based Smith & Nephew is offering is too low. The shareholders’ confidence reflects a hot healthcare robotics space, where capital, consolidation, and chasing new applications are driving factors.
Venus Concept Ltd. merged with hair-implant provider Restoration Robotics for $21 million, and Shanghai Changren Information Technology raised Series A funding of $14.89 million for its Xiaobao healthcare robot.
Aside from Lyft, the biggest reported transportation robotics transaction in March 2019 was Renesas’ completion of its $6.7 billion purchase of Integrated Device Technology Inc. for its self-driving car chips.
The next biggest deal was Weltmeister Motor’s $450 million Series C, in which Baidu Inc. participated.
Lidar also got some support, with Innoviz Technologies raising $132 million in a Series C round, and Ouster raising $60 million. In a prime example of how driverless technology is “paying a peace dividend” to other applications, Google parent Alphabet’s Waymo unit offered its custom lidar sensors to robotics, security, and agricultural companies.
Automakers recognize the need for 3-D modeling, sensors, and software for autonomous vehicles to navigate safely and accurately. A Daimler unit acquired Torc Robotics Inc., which is working on driverless trucks, and CycloMedia acquired machine vision firm Floating Point FX. The amounts were not specified.
Speaking of machine learning, Appen Ltd. acquired dataset annotation company Figure Eight for $175 million, with an possible $125 million more based on 2019 performance. Denso Corp. and Toyota Motor Corp. contributed $15 million to Airbiquity, which is working on connected vehicles.
Service robots clean up
From retail to cleaning and customer service, the combination of improving human-machine interactions, ongoing staffing turnover and shortages, and companies with round-the-clock operations has contributed to investor interest.
The SoftBank Vision Fund participated in a $300 million round for CloudMinds. The Chinese AI and robotics company’s XR-1 is a humanoid service robot, and it also makes security robots and connects robots to the cloud.
According to its filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, TakeOff Technologies Inc. raised an unspecified amount for its grocery robots, an area that many observers expect to grow as consumers become more accustomed to getting home deliveries.
On the cleaning side, Avidbots raised $23.6 million in Series B, led by True Ventures. Gaussian Robotics’ Series B was $14.9 million, with participation from Grand Flight Investment.
China’s efforts to develop its domestic robotics industry continued, as Emergen Group’s $29 million Series B round was the largest reported investment in industrial automation last month.
Hangzhou Guochen Robot Technology raised $15 million in Series A funding for robotics research and development and integration.
Data startup Spopondrift and underwater drone maker OpenROV merged to form Sofar Ocean Technologies. The new San Francisco company also announced a Series A round of $7 million. Also, 4Subsea acquired underwater control systems maker Astori AS.
In the aerial drone space, Kratos Defense and Security Solutions acquired Florida Turbine Technologies for $60 million, and Vtrus raised $2.9 million for commercializing drone inspections. Kaarta Inc., which makes a lidar for indoor mapping, raised $6.5 million.
The Robot Reportbroke the news of Aria Insights, formerly known as CyPhy Works, shutting down in March 2019.
Editors Note: What defines robotics investments? The answer to this simple question is central in any attempt to quantify robotics investments with some degree of rigor. To make investment analyses consistent, repeatable, and valuable, it is critical to wring out as much subjectivity as possible during the evaluation process. This begins with a definition of terms and a description of assumptions.
Investors and Investing
Investment should come from venture capital firms, corporate investment groups, angel investors, and other sources. Friends-and-family investments, government/non-governmental agency grants, and crowd-sourced funding are excluded.
Robotics and Intelligent Systems Companies
Robotics companies must generate or expect to generate revenue from the production of robotics products (that sense, think, and act in the physical world), hardware or software subsystems and enabling technologies for robots, or services supporting robotics devices. For this analysis, autonomous vehicles (including technologies that support autonomous driving) and drones are considered robots, while 3D printers, CNC systems, and various types of “hard” automation are not.
Companies that are “robotic” in name only, or use the term “robot” to describe products and services that that do not enable or support devices acting in the physical world, are excluded. For example, this includes “software robots” and robotic process automation. Many firms have multiple locations in different countries. Company locations given in the analysis are based on the publicly listed headquarters in legal documents, press releases, etc.
Verification
Funding information is collected from a number of public and private sources. These include press releases from corporations and investment groups, corporate briefings, and association and industry publications. In addition, information comes from sessions at conferences and seminars, as well as during private interviews with industry representatives, investors, and others. Unverifiable investments are excluded.
What makes a robotics cluster successful? Proximity to university research and talent, government support of entrepreneurship, and a focus on industry end users are all important. Around the world, regions have proclaimed initiatives to become “the next Silicon Valley.” However, there have been relatively few metrics to describe robotics hubs — until now.
This week, Odense Robotics in Denmark released a report on the economic returns generated by its member companies. Both the amount of exports and the number of employees have increased by about 50 percent, according to Mikkel Christoffersen, business manager at Odense Robotics.
At the same time, the report is realistic about the ongoing challenges facing every robotics cluster, including finding qualified job candidates. As locales from India to Israel and Canada to China look to stimulate innovation, they should look at their own mixes of people, partnerships, and economic performance.
Membership and money
The Odense robotics cluster currently has 129 member companies and more than 10 research and educational institutions. That’s up from 85 in 2015 and comparable with Massachusetts, which is home to more than 150 robotics companies. The Massachusetts Robotics Cluster said it had 122 members as of 2016.
Silicon Valley Robotics says it has supported 325 robot startups, and “Roboburgh” in Pittsburgh includes more than 50 organizations..
In terms of economic performance, the Odense robotics cluster had 763 million euros ($866.3 million U.S.) in turnover, or revenue, in 2017. It expects another 20 percent increase by 2021.
Odense has been friendly to startups, with 64 founded since 2010. The Odense Robotics StartUp Hub has helped to launch 15 companies. Seventy companies, or 54 percent, of those in the Odense area have fewer than 10 employees.
Total investments in the Danish robotics cluster have risen from 322 million euros ($365.6 million) in 2015 to 750 million euros ($851.7 million) last year, with 42 percent coming from investors rather than public funding or loans.
Source: Odense Robotics
In addition, 71 local companies were robotics producers, up from 58 in 2017. The next largest category was integrators at 23. The region also boasted 509 million euros ($577.9 million) in exports in 2017, and 66 percent of its members expect to begin exports.
Market focus
The Odense Robotics report notes that a third of its member companies work with collaborative and mobile robots, representing its focus on manufacturing and supply chain customers. Those are both areas of especially rapid growth in the wider robotics ecosystem.
The global collaborative robotics market will experience a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 49.8 percent between 2016 and 2025, compared with a CAGR of 12.1 percent for industrial robots, predicts ABI Research. Demand from small and midsize enterprises will lead revenues to exceed $1.23 billion in 2025, said ABI.
Both Universal Robots and MiR have broadened their international reach, thanks to ownership by Teradyne Inc. in North Reading, Mass.
Robotics cluster must address talent shortage
Odense Robotics said that its robotics cluster employs 3,600 people today and expects that figure to rise to 4,900 by next year. In comparison, the Massachusetts robotics cluster employed about 4,700 people in 2016.
The Danish robotics cluster is a significant employer. Source: Odense Robotics
Even as the numbers of people grow at larger robotics companies (with 50 or more employees) or abroad, businesses in southern Denmark have to look far afield to meet their staffing needs. More than a third, or 39 percent, said they expect to hire from outside of Denmark, and 78 percent said that finding qualified recruits is the biggest barrier to growth.
The average age of employees in the Odense robotics cluster reflects experience, as well as difficulty recruiting. Fifty-five percent of them are age 40 to 60, while only 18 percent are under 30.
This reflects a larger problem for robotics developers and vendors. Even with STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) programs and attention paid to education, the demand for hardware and software engineers worldwide outstrips the available pool.
The University of Southern Denmark (SDU) is working to address this. It has increased admissions for its bachelor’s degrees in engineering and science and master’s of science programs from 930 in 2015 to 1,235 last year. The university also launched a bachelor’s in engineering for robot systems, admitting 150 students since 2017.
The Danish Technological Institute is expanding its facilities in Odense this year. Source: DTI
Another positive development that other robotics clusters can learn from Odense is that 41 percent of workers at robotics firms there went to vocational schools rather than universities.
Partnerships and prospects
Close collaboration with research institutions, fellow robotics cluster members, and international companies has helped the Odense hub grow. Seventy eight percent of cluster members collaborate among themselves, according to the report. Also, 38 percent collaborate with more than 10 companies.
The Odense robotics cluster grew out of a partnership between shipping giant Maersk A/S and SDU. The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute at SDU continues to conduct research into robotics, artificial intelligence, and systems for healthcare and the energy industry. It recently added aerial drones, soft robotics, and virtual reality to its portfolio.
Last year, the institute invested 13.4 million euros ($15.22 million) in an Industry 4.0 laboratory, and an SDU team won in the industrial robot category at the World Robot Summit Challenge in Japan.
Examples such as Universal Robots and MiR, as well as Denmark’s central position in Northern Europe, are encouraging companies to look for partners. Collaborating with companies inside and outside the Odense robotics cluster is a top priority of members, with 98 percent planning to make it a strategic focus in the next three years.
It’s only through collective action around robotics clusters that smart regions, large and small, can find their niches, build talent, and maximize the returns on their investments.
Editor’s note: A panel at the Robotics Summit & Expo in Boston on June 5 and 6, 2019, will feature speakers from different robotics clusters. Register now to attend.
In the wake of the closure of Apple’s autonomous car division (Project Titan) this week, one questions if Steve Jobs’ axiom still holds true. “Some people say, ‘Give the customers what they want.’ But that’s not my approach. Our job is to figure out what they’re going to want before they do,” declared Jobs, who continued with an analogy: “I think Henry Ford once said, ‘If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have told me, ‘a faster horse!’” Titan joins a growing graveyard of autonomous innovations, which is filled with the tombstones of Baxter, Jibo, Kuri and many broken quadcopters. If anything holds true, not every founder is Steve Jobs or Henry Ford and listening to public backlash could be a bellwether for success.
Adam Jonas of Morgan Stanley announced on Jan. 9, 2019 from the Consumer Electronic Show (CES) floor, “It’s official. AVs are overhyped. Not that the safety, economic, and efficiency benefits of robotaxis aren’t valid and noble. They are. It’s the timing… the telemetry of adoption for L5 cars without safety drivers expected by many investors may be too aggressive by a decade… possibly decades.”
The timing sentiment is probably best echoed by the backlash by the inhabitants of Chandler, Arizona who have been protesting vocally, even resorting to violence, against Waymo’s self-driving trials on their streets. This rancor came to a head in August when a 69-year-old local pointed his pistol at the robocar (and its human safety driver).
In a profile of the Arizona beta trial, The New York Times interviewed some of the loudest advocates against Waymo in the Phoenix suburb. Erik and Elizabeth O’Polka expressed frustration with their elected leaders in turning their neighbors and their children into guinea pigs for artificial intelligence.
Elizabeth adamantly decried, “They didn’t ask us if we wanted to be part of their beta test.” Her husband strongly agreed: “They said they need real-world examples, but I don’t want to be their real-world mistake.” The couple has been warned several times by the Chandler police to stop attempting to run Waymo cars off the road. Elizabeth confessed to the Times, “that her husband ‘finds it entertaining to brake hard’ in front of the self-driving vans, and that she herself ‘may have forced them to pull over’ so she could yell at them to get out of their neighborhood.” The reporter revealed that the backlash tensions started to boil “when their 10-year-old son was nearly hit by one of the vehicles while he was playing in a nearby cul-de-sac.”
The deliberate sabotaging by the O’Polkas could be indicative of the attitudes of millions of citizens who feel ignored by the speed of innovation. Deployments that run oblivious to this view, relying solely on the excitement of investors and insiders, ultimately face backlash when customers flock to competitors.
In the cobot world, the early battle between Rethink Robotics and Universal Robots (UR) is probably one of the most high-flying examples of tone-deaf invention by engineers. Rethink’s eventual demise was a classic case of form over function with a lot of hype sprinkled on top.
Rodney Brooks‘ collaborative robotics enterprise raised close to $150 million in its short decade-long existence. The startup rode the coattails of fame of its co-founder, who is often referred to as the godfather of robotics, before ever delivering a product.
Dedicated Rethink distributor, Dan O’Brien, recalled, “I’ve never seen a product get so much publicity. I fell in love with Rethink in 2010.” Its first product, Baxter, released in 2012 and promised to bring safety, productivity, and a little whimsy to the factory floor. The robot stood at around six feet tall with two bright colored red arms that were connected to an animated screen complete with friendly facial expressions.
At the same time, Rethink’s robots were not able to perform as advertised in industrial environments, leading to a backlash and slow adoption. The problem stemmed from Brooks’ insistence in licensing their actuation technology, “Series Elastic Actuators (SEAs),” from former employer MIT instead of embracing the leading actuator, Harmonic Drive, for its mobility. Users demanded greater exactness in their machines that competitors such as UR, a Harmonic customer, took the helm in delivering.
Universal Robots’ cobots perform better than those of the late Rethink Robotics.
The backlash to Baxter is best illustrated by the comments of Steve Leach, president of Numatic Engineering, an automation integrator. In 2010, Leach hoped that Rethink could be “the iPhone of the industrial automation world.”
However, “Baxter wasn’t accurate or smooth,” said Leach, who was dismayed after seeing the final product. “After customers watched the demo, they lost interest because Baxter was not able to meet their needs.”
“We signed on early, a month before Baxter was released, and thought the software and mechanics would be refined. But they were not,” sighed Leach. In the six years since Baxter’s disappointing launch Rethink did little to address the SEAs problem. Most of the 1,000 Baxters sold by Rethink were delivered to academia, not the commercial industry.
By contrast, Universal booked more 27,000 robots since its founding in 2005. Even Leach, who spent a year passionately trying to sell a single Baxter unit, switched to UR and sold his first one within a week. Leach elaborated, “From the ground up, UR’s firmware and hardware were specifically developed for industrial applications and met the expectations of those customers. That’s really where Rethink missed the mark.”
As machines permeate human streets, factories, offices, and homes, building a symbiotic relationship between intended operators and creators is even more critical. Too often, I meet entrepreneurs who demonstrate concepts with little input from potential buyers. This past January, the aisles of CES were littered with such items, but the one above was designed with a potential backlash in mind.
Simplehuman, the product development firm known for its elegantly designed housewares, unveiled a $200 aluminum robot trash can. This is part of a new line of Simplehuman’s own voice-activated products, potentially competing with Amazon Alexa. In the words of its founder, Frank Yang, “Sometimes, it’s just about pre-empting the users’ needs, and including features we think they would appreciate. If they don’t, we can always go back to the drawing board and tweak the product again.”
To understand the innovation ecosystem in the age of hackers join the next RobotLab series on “Cybersecurity & Machines” with John Frankel of ffVC and Guy Franklin of SOSA – February 12th in New York City, seating is limited so RSVP today!
Keynotes
