FRANKFURT, Germany—A new technology that promises to make robotic painting of cars faster, more flexible and less wasteful has earned an international award for innovation.
Traditionally, robots have worked alone inside safety cages or fences. But, more applications on assembly lines today require humans and machines to work in close proximity.
MyAppCafé is a fully automated robotic barista. The machine is the brainchild of caterer and entrepreneur Michael Stille of Karlsruhe, Germany, who envisioned a fully automated system for vending coffee at catered events and trade shows.
A simple mechanical watch contains roughly 130 components. More complex watches contain hundreds of parts. A top-of-the-line model can have well over 1,000 parts.
FRANKFURT—Updated statistics issued by the International Federation of Robotics show that the average robot density in the manufacturing industry reached a new global record of 113 units per 10,000 employees in 2019.
Robots are becoming nearly as common in assembly plants as nutrunners and conveyors. The advent of collaborative robots is only furthering that trend. However, as robots play a greater role on the line, engineers must ensure that workers remain safe around the technology.
Medical doctors have increasingly become specialized during the last 25 years or so. But, industrial robots have been specialists by design since they began being used for manufacturing in the early 1960s.