What if doing your job stopped feeling like a job? And repetitive tasks turned into fun? Or was strenuous work supplanted by voice instructions? Automatica 2025 will demonstrate how near reality has approached this dream. In this event, exhibitors globally will demonstrate how robots, cobots, and humanoids engage with and assist people as new and thrilling job roles emerge.
Cobots are becoming more prevalent in the workforce. They aid in rehabilitation therapy, carry out repetitive administrative duties, or work in cafeteria kitchens. For instance, Fanuc, an exhibitor at automatica, will showcase a cooking station featuring a cobot that assembles sandwiches and a six-axis industrial robot that cooks meals. Yaskawa will showcase intelligent culinary solutions that could offset staff shortages.
Affordable automation at Bender+Wirth: a blueprint for SME achievement
Bender+Wirth serves as a real-world example of cost-effective automation implementation. The medium-sized firm sought a solution for CoB (Chip-on-Board) component assembly, but traditional system integrators were outside their budget. They carried out their automation internally with a customized robot cell design utilizing Scara robots provided by Epson. Managing Director Martin Bender states: “The simplicity of integration and programming was the key reason—our staff member was entirely able to configure the system following training at Epson.” This instance demonstrates that even relatively small firms with restricted resources can gain from contemporary robotics.
This development could be another boost to cobot deployments as many companies are indeed focusing on the acquisition of robots to compensate for the shortage of skilled workers. And since cobots are becoming increasingly affordable while programming and parameterization become easier, robot deployments are now economical for small companies, too. At automatica, igus will prove just how cost-effective the adoption of robotics can be.
This Cologne-based company offers cobots starting at EUR 5,000 and uses its own production facility to demonstrate associated use cases. Alexander Mühlens, Head of Low Cost Automation Business Unit: “For example, we use robots in our injection molding plant to remove sprues. The robot costs around EUR 10,000 and return on investment is achieved after just six months.” This makes cobots an efficient solution for SMEs, particularly since commissioning does not require any robot specialists.
AI qualifies robots for new tasks
The easier and more intuitive collaborative robot handling gets, the more application potential is unlocked. So it is unsurprising that manufacturers do everything in their power to qualify their cobots for the widest possible range of tasks by using artificial intelligence. For example, Universal Robots has lately presented the UR AI Accelerator as a solution for developers to equip their robotics solutions with the latest AI technology.
Delta Electronics have taken a similar path. The company will use automatica as an opportunity to showcase their innovative Cognibot Kit and how it enables fitting cobots of the D Bot series with advanced cognitive capabilities such as voice control, 3D machine vision systems, Artificial Intelligence, and more. Delta significantly expands the range of these cobots’ deployment options across various manufacturing environments through improved performance.
Michael Mayer-Rosa, Global Head of Intelligent Robot Systems (IRS) at Delta, comments: “The Cognibot Kit unlocks cognitive robotics for companies of all sizes. This is particularly advantageous for countries such as Germany where SMEs form a large part of the economy and are faced with labor shortages. Easy integration into existing environments was a key focus as it enables smaller companies to take advantage of the efficiency and flexibility that cost-effective solutions for automation in production, logistics, and service offer.”
Workable, simple solutions at automatica
Such workable, simple solutions are what European SMEs need—and automatica is the place to find them. And the best part is: The barriers to entry for automation will decrease even further very soon. Robot and systems manufacturers are working hard to develop voice-controlled models intended to make programming easy for just anyone. automatica will show just how far the developments in this sector have already come.