At the heart of adaptive robotics is intelligent software that enables the simplified integration of tactile, spatially-visual robots into data-driven automation processes: there are four key trends that are currently shaping automation and will represent the central challenge in the coming years. How can companies address these and respond effectively to key issues such as labor shortages, increasing product and variant diversity, component complexity and changing supply chain requirements?

Trend 1: Labor shortage

Across Europe, companies are struggling to find workers for simple, manual tasks and to retain them after the training phase. Demographic and cultural changes mean that workers are increasingly less willing to perform manual tasks or monotonous tasks. The age of manual labor is rapidly coming to an end.

Trend 2: Diversity of variants

Despite all standardization approaches such as building blocks, module groups and the like, product diversity and the number of variants are increasing. This poses enormous challenges for automation and makes it more difficult to simplify production processes or individual sub-processes. Production must be able to adapt flexibly to the characteristics of each individual variant and be set up in such a way that even small batches can be produced economically.

Trend 3: More complex components

Complexity is not only driven by variant diversity. Electronic integration in mechatronic products and subsystems is also increasing. Components are increasingly being equipped with sensors, network and computer components. This increases the demands on the overall production process, as sensitive components now have to be manufactured and assembled with high precision in more and more sub-steps. Inaccuracies and rough handling processes can quickly lead to component failure if individual electrical components are damaged.

Trend 4: Shorter delivery times

Shorter product life cycles, just-in-time and just-in-sequence requirements, greater competitive pressure and much more are forcing manufacturers to achieve shorter and precisely plannable delivery times. At the same time, overloaded logistics, geopolitical instability, strong price fluctuations and much more are creating major supply chain obstacles. As a result, the time and organizational demands on production have recently increased massively. It must become more resilient to unforeseeable changes in the supply chain.

How can we counter these trends?

The most obvious approach to countering the decline in available labor is probably automated production, which can also bring further benefits such as quality gains and assurance as well as increased productivity. However, this is countered by the three other current trends that often prevent cost-effective automation with a traditional approach. The only possible solution is a process that combines the best of both worlds: Robotic automation must be expanded to include the flexibility of human skills.

One promising solution is tactile robots with spatial vision that are flexible and largely self-configuring and can be used in a variety of ways. With the ability to orientate and set themselves up independently, challenges such as variant diversity, complex components and the high time requirements can be addressed without having to rely on the flexibility of a human at every step.

The basic hardware - i.e. robots and sensors - is already sufficiently available. The big challenge is to combine the components in such a way that added value is created for the production process without negatively impacting profitability. As the processes are becoming increasingly complex, programming the systems is also becoming more demanding. The number of parameters to be set and their interrelationships can quickly become so extensive that they can no longer be solved by a process developer in a reasonable amount of time.

At the same time, the abilities to see and feel and their integration into classic industrial robots are a future indispensable approach that can be tackled in a standardized way. Complex software only needs to be programmed once and can be applied to different processes. In the best case scenario, the processes can be automatically adapted using sensor data, i.e. optimized on a data-driven basis. This opens up optimization potential that cannot even be achieved by human experts.

The challenge is to enable a type of robot programming that allows existing processes and process development methods to be adapted as easily as possible. No manufacturing company can convert its entire production and replace its systems in one fell swoop. It must therefore be possible to simply add the new capabilities to individual production steps.

Flexible thanks to software-driven robotics

The essential core of adaptive robotics is intelligent software: both the programs that are executed on the robot controller and the tools for their targeted implementation and maintenance must be data-driven. As Trend 1 - the shortage of skilled workers - is also having a relevant impact here, the automation of the development of production processes, for example through the use of AI, comes into play alongside the automation of production. The markets of tomorrow are open to the manufacturing companies that know how to exploit the opportunities offered by software-driven robotics most quickly and consistently.

To help companies meet new and changing requirements, Artiminds Robotics specializes in the development of software solutions that enable the automatic generation of adaptive, flexible and robust production processes. The strengths of the software solutions lie in the simplified integration of tactile robots with spatial vision into data-driven process automation and in the gradual integration of state-of-the-art technologies such as artificial intelligence. And all this while taking into account robustness, traceability and compatibility with existing conditions. This allows the degree of automation of individual production steps to be successively increased. They also enable reliable, data-driven, automated development and optimization of robot programs. The support provided by Artiminds software reduces the effort involved in manual robot programming and enables manufacturing companies to adapt more quickly and flexibly to future trends.