DEARBORN, MI—Ford Motor Co. has welcomed two new employees to its Van Dyke Transmission Plant in Sterling Heights, MI. Named Fluffy and Spot, they have four legs, and they can sit, shake hands, roll over and climb stairs.

WARTON, UK—BAE Systems will open a new assembly plant at its manufacturing complex here that will apply cobots, virtual and augmented reality, and other advanced technologies to the assembly of military aircraft.

FRANKFURT — The International Federations of Robotics has published a new paper, “World Robotics R&D Programs," which explores various government-funding programs in Asia, Europe and America. These new technologies include artificial intelligence, big data and 5G.

In this insightful RoboBusiness Direct presentation, FedEx’s Aaron Prather will review the continuing opportunities for robotics solutions in the logistics sector. Prather has successfully deployed robotics applications within FedEx, and he has seen other initiatives go off the rail.

Bossa Nova Robotics is one of the leaders in the retail robotics sector, providing large retailers with inventory-scanning robots that move up and down aisles, tracking inventory supply levels via computer vision and artificial intelligence.

In this RoboBusiness Direct session, you will learn about one of the biggest opportunities for providers of robotics technologies—retrofitting manually steered vehicles used in various industries to support autonomous navigation. The session will include data on shipments and revenues, as well as overviews of well-known providers of autonomous navigation systems, including Brain Corp., BlueBotics, Built Robotics and Outrider.