Mantis Robotics achieves safety certification for fenceless, high-speed industrial robot

Physical AI for robotic automation developer Mantis Robotics said that its Mantis MR-1 flagship robot arm has become the first fenceless, high-speed industrial arm to receive safety certification to ISO 10218 and ISO 13849.

By integrating proprietary physical AI, Mantis Robotics said that the MR-1 eliminates the traditional "safety vs. speed" compromise, allowing high-speed throughput in shared human workspaces without the need for physical barriers.

Safety enables next generation of robotics

Mantis Robotics said its safety-certified, fenceless technology moves beyond individual hardware to provide the foundational platform for human-robot collaboration in the AI era. As AI-powered robots and humanoids move from controlled industrial cells into shared human environments - warehouses, factories and eventually homes - safety becomes the critical enabler of scale. Mantis said it is building the essential safety architecture required for AI and humanoids to scale from factories into everyday environments.

"This safety certification represents a true breakthrough for robotics, creating an entirely new category of robot that can interact safely with people without compromising productivity," said Gerry Vannuffelen, CEO, Mantis Robotics. "The bottleneck to scaling AI robots isn't intelligence; it's safety. Mantis' revolutionary proximity detection technology enables robots - in any form - to autonomously and safely adjust to the world around them, at industrial speeds. With this technology, we're unlocking one of the largest platform opportunities in robotics."

With 47 embedded safety functions compared to 17 in the most commonly deployed robots or cobots on the market, Mantis said that its MR-1 robot is engineered for safety. The company said that all safety features are certified PL=d (Performance Level d), signifying a high level of reliability and functional safety. The MR-1's embedded range-based object detection ("STAR") is powered by Mantis SafetyCore, to continuously monitor for dynamic objects within its operating range. It automatically adjusts speed and behavior to support safe human-robot collaboration.

Mantis MR-1 details

The Mantis MR-1 robot arm comes with a 5kg payload, maximum speed up to 10 m/s and a 900mm reach. The robot ships standard with a robot controller and the Mantis Studio code-free deployment software with a 3D digital twin and real-world modeling features. 

"The robot's combination of Physical AI and code-free, rapid deployment - in the exact same footprint as a human worker - drives maximum productivity and a superior return on automation investment," Vannuffelen said.

The MR-1 is now certified to ISO 10218-1 and ISO 13849-1 and carries CE marking, which Mantis said demonstrates compliance with EU machinery and functional safety requirements. ISO 10218-1 is the international standard for industrial robot safety requirements, incorporating safe design, installation, operation and maintenance of robot systems. ISO 13849-1 is the foundational standard for safety-related parts of control systems across all machinery; a universal requirement for machine safety.

Mantis Robotics said that the MR-1 safety certification was issued by SGS Fimko Oy, the Finnish subsidiary of SGS SA.