On March 7, 2018, Nathan Sykes writes on Robotic Business Review:
Manufacturing automation has been common since the 1970s. Advances in technology, including robotics, big data, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things have improved factory production since then.
Collaborative robots — also called cobots — are sweeping across the industry. Rather than take over for laborers completely, cobots can work alongside humans to improve efficiency and reduce hazards. Autonomous mobile platforms are popular in factories and warehouses, as seen in Amazon’s fulfillment centers.
Here are some robotics trends that are driving the evolution of manufacturing automation.
RaaS can help manage costs
Software as a service and cloud computing tools have revolutionized all industries, especially smaller startups and midsize operations. Not only do they allow organizations to remain stress-free about the maintenance and operation of their crucial systems, but they also alleviate the burden of costly adoption for smaller teams.
Robotics as a service (RaaS) is similar, and it involves the rental or temporary acquisition of hardware to keep costs more manageable. This has allowed more advanced technologies and robots to penetrate the agriculture industry, for example, which is usually extremely cost-sensitive. Farmers can rent and use equipment they couldn’t before, and in return, pay agreed-upon rates.
Companies in the RaaS space include Savioke, Robosoft Services Robots, and Acorn Product Development.
Cobots come to manufacturing automation
Innova Research estimates that cobots account for 4% of the total industrial robots that were shipped in 2015.
In addition to being able to work alongside humans, unlike their older, caged cousins, cobots can be more versatile. They are smaller and can handle multiple tasks, such as pick-and-place operations for goods on a production line.
Cobots can help eliminate rote or dangerous work, freeing humans for more satisfying jobs. People can aid with perception and avoid repetitive stress.
In addition, cobots are increasingly backed by machine learning and AI platforms that let them perform more advanced tasks and share lessons learned.
Most of the standard industrial automation providers, such as ABB, offer cobots, and specialized vendors such as Rethink Robotics or Universal Robots have experienced rapid growth in response to market demand.
Upgrades for older systems
Manufacturing automation doesn’t just include brand-new technologies. Older systems and known setups can be made more compact, get new controls, and become more efficient and accessible.
By improving age-old designs and robotics hardware, businesses can save money and free up valuable factory or warehouse space.
The EPSON Flexion N-Series 6-Axis Robot, for example, uses a compact folding design to reduce the required space by up to 40% when compared to other six-axis robots. It can also work in more confined spaces, negating the need for large open spaces trimming down the amount of warehouse or factory space carved out for robots.
Rockwell Automation and Schneider Electric offer services to help manufacturers evaluate where they can modernize, and of course, apply manufacturing automation.
Robotics and IoT
The emerging industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) takes data from connected, always-on devices and allows manufacturers to gain insights in real time.
IoT lets hardware be smarter, faster, and more aware. Coupled with sensors, a mobile robot could, for example, identify when a worker’s presence is in the vicinity, and slow or stop production altogether to make time for necessary input.
Another robot can be put on a schedule to speed up or slow down based on its surroundings or the timing of small-batch production cycles.
The beauty of IoT sensors when combined with robots is that they are connected to a larger network. Robots can even be designed to collaborate with one another and work more intelligently.
One company focused with an IoT mind-set is ABB. The company has crafted systems that can store and analyze their own usage data, which is communicated to other devices. This allows robots to consistently improve and grow over time, becoming efficiency powerhouses.
Gary Reber Comments:
The NOW challenge is to provide income for millions in a future where there will be hordes of citizens of zero economic value. Exponentially, work of citizens will be affected by the exponential impact the non-human factor of production is having on how our economy produces goods, products and services, allowing us to produce more goods, products and services with far less or the same amount of human labor, doing work that humans are entirely not capable of or would rather not toil at, and doing such most efficiently and at greater consistent quality at less costs to the business corporations who substitute labor workers with the non-human means of production.
News From The Center for Economic and Social Justice (www.cesj.org) Network:
There has been a lot of noise circulating about the basic income plan. It sounds very nice to say that everyone should have enough to live on as a fundamental human right. The problem is, however, that people who produce what others consume without getting anything in return tend to get resentful. This sets up an “us v. them” mentality, and demands that all those people not working be punished or eliminated. As Abraham Lincoln noted in his debates with Stephen Douglas, it’s against nature for some to work and others to benefit: “It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, ‘You toil and work and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.’ No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.” As the first principle of economics and Say’s Law of Markets make clear, no one can consume what has not been produced . . . and anyone who consumes without producing can only get it from those who produce.
And yes, in the future, the vast majority will have zero economic value. And yet there are those who would allow a political elite to dictate over you and be owned by them instead of owning yourself and self-sufficient. See http://www.foreconomicjustice.org/?p=16392. The real solution is to empower EVERY child, woman and man to contribute productively to the society’s economy and build a future economy applying technology and responsible renewal growth by acquiring and accumulating the wealth-creating, income-producing capital assets of the future. This can be accomplished without the requirement of past savings or pledging equity to banks as collateral to secure capital credit loans, repayable out of the future earnings of the investments. Instead access to capital credit can be collateralized with capital credit insurance and reinsurance on a financially feasible basis using a tax deferred program permitting an accumulation to a level capital self-sufficiency.
Support Monetary Justice at http://capitalhomestead.org/page/monetary-justice.
Support the enactment of the Capital Homestead Act (aka Economic Democracy Act) at http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/, http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/capital-homestead-act-a-plan-for-getting-ownership-income-and-power-to-every-citizen/, http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/capital-homestead-act-summary/ and http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/ch-vehicles/.
