The center is part of the company's comprehensive strategy to promote flexible automation in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The test center, which is housed in ABB's Global Solution Center for machine tending, will work with customers and partners from around the world to develop innovative solutions for integration into their systems.

"The opening of our new Random Bin Picking test center is a significant milestone in our efforts to drive automation in industries that are currently difficult to automate. The ability to handle randomly arranged parts accurately, quickly and efficiently significantly increases flexibility in parts feeding," emphasizes Andrea Cassoni, Head of the Global Business Line General Industry at ABB Robotics. "Compared to conventional systems, our automated random bin picking solution enables more efficient material handling, which often pays for itself for our customers in less than 12 months."

Random bin-picking technology

ABB intends to use the new test center to accelerate the further development of its random bin-picking technology. This comprises an ABB robot including a 3D camera, which enables it to pick up parts in different arrangements and orientations. By recognizing objects regardless of their orientation, randomly arranged components in a box or on a pallet can be fed without the need for manual pre-sorting or alignment.

With conventional, structured bin-picking systems, objects must be in a specific orientation before the robot can pick them up and move them. Arranging parts by hand is not only time-consuming, but also carries the risk of injury, while incorrect feeding can result in production delays.

Goal: Complete automation

Fully automating the bin-picking process increases the efficiency, productivity and flexibility of manufacturing processes and speeds up material handling and other processes such as machine loading and parts feeding. It also paves the way for the automation of other processes within the factory, such as the use of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) that automatically transport pallets of parts to the robot cell. ABB's smallest robotic machine tending cell has a footprint of just three square meters, which opens up completely new possibilities for integration into existing production lines.

ABB's new Random Bin Picking Test Center offers customers and partners the opportunity to test different configurations and scenarios prior to implementation. This minimizes the risks, time and costs typically associated with implementing bin picking applications and reduces disruption during installation. The team uses RobotStudio, ABB's leading simulation and programming software, to model processes before physical cells are built.

ABB's automated bin-picking solution is the result of a close collaboration between ABB's Global Solution Center for machine tending and a network of partner companies specializing in the development and deployment of 3D imaging technologies.