Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.74
…to be presented and controls take place. Eurotunnel Le Shuttle Freight, operator of the railway shuttle service between France and the UK through the Channel Tunnel, is also delighted that a long period of uncertainty ends. As part of its ongoing Brexit preparations, it has launched the Eurotunnel Border Pass. This new service will enable customers to upload all the data needed for their journey in a secure format to a virtual wallet, accessible during their crossing by Eurotunnel and the authorities of the two states. In particular, it will enable the data needed for goods to cross the border…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.66
…also used in loading/offloading of objects within the space shuttle. Three of the most widely known space manipulators are: Canadarm1—14.7 m (48.8 ft.) long arms Canadarm2—17.5 m (57.7 ft.) long arms Special-Purpose Dexterous Manipulator (SPDM) or Dextre—3.3 m (11 ft.) long arms Why is robotics the only way into space? Future space missions will be longer A typical one-way trip to the International Space Station (ISS) takes about two days, a trip to the moon is a minimum of three days, and a trip to the closest planet would take several months. As humanity pushes to explore deeper into space,…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.54
…conventional racking. Sullivan said this costs less than pallet shuttles or unit-load ASRS but achieves similar efficiencies. “There are many operations that just can’t hire enough people, and many others that struggle with high turnover,” he said. “Autonomous robots can reduce these challenges by automating some key workflows, enabling operations to take their best employees and put them on higher value tasks.” Sullivan also sees the ROI for autonomous robots coming in at two years or less, with both leasing and buying options, although payback time varies based on labor rates and other factors. In addition, AutoGuide has looked at…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.50
…racking, which Sullivan says is lower cost than pallet shuttles or unit-load AS/RS solutions, but achieves similar efficiencies. Overall, he adds, the need is growing for operations of all sizes to automate the movement of pallets to overcome labor availability issues. “There are many operations that just can’t hire enough people and many others that struggle with high turnover,” says Sullivan. “Autonomous robots can reduce these challenges by automating some key workflows, enabling operations to take their best employees and put them on higher value tasks.” Sullivan also sees the ROI for autonomous robots coming in at two years or…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.49
…justify the cost of conventional automation, such as a shuttle system, in its smaller footprint facilities. With regard to the latter, Manzione was sold on two things. One was the cultural fit between RSL and its robotics supplier. “Sitting across the table from them, we felt they understood our operations and our needs,” he says. The other was the robotics-as-a-service model. “Robotics-as-a-service allows us to scale up or down, based on volume, without having to call a temp service to add people right away,” he says. “And, with the variability of volume in e-commerce, you’re constantly scaling up and down.”…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.20
…case handing, automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS), a shuttle system, vertical lift modules, robotic palletizing and depalletizing, and RFID for tracking. In addition to a focus on automation, sustainability was at the heart of the design. “Sustainability is a key component of HARTING’s 2030 strategy,” Meyer noted, adding that all of the energy in the facility comes from renewable sources. Regenerative braking on storage and retrieval cranes put energy back into the system, and an energy management system ensures the facility optimizes the energy it does use. Similarly, ergonomics played a key role in the design. “The heart of…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 3.17
…in Devens, Mass. There, some 200 orange Kiva robots shuttle 5,000 shelving units from a storage area to picking stations where order selectors fill orders. As one of the early adopters of mobile robotics for e-commerce fulfillment, Quiet has been using Kiva since 2009. And while the leading edge is called the bleeding edge for a reason, Bruce Welty, Quiet’s co-founder and CEO, says that getting out front with robots was a conscious decision he made with his partner Mike Johnson, Quiet’s president. “No one had really used mobile robotics like this before,” says Welty. “Mike and I felt that…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 2.97
…notes. “But, what if you want to add a shuttle system, an AutoStore, a piece-picking robot or an IAM Robotics area? Right now, those are each deployed as point solutions. Down the road, they can be deployed together.” The system is also capable of creating a profile of individual workers based on their mistakes. “The system can take into account all of the resources in the facility, from the robots to the people to the conveyors,” Elazary says. “We can then assign workers to specific jobs to take advantage of their strengths, or to give them relief.” Core competency Not…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 2.83
…storage and computation tasks. This precludes the need to shuttle data between memory and processor, saving time and reducing energy consumption by as much as 90%. In-memory computing can cache large amounts of data, greatly speed response times and store session data, which helps to optimize performance. “We need to evolve to a new type of computing platform, where we lose less power in moving data up and down to the compute engine,” says Lauwereins. “We need to compute in memory, where the data stays where it is stored and can be processed at that same place.” Processing Goes Analog…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 2.82
…just industry giants. You may not put a $1,000,000+ multi-shuttle in a mid-sized company’s DC, but you can now implement AMRs. NorthShore Care Supply is an illustration of both those ideas. The company is the leader in the distribution of super-premium incontinence supplies and adult diapers, sold online for home delivery but also with a growing channel shipping to institutions. Either way, orders are stored at the case level rather than the unit level and mostly picked in cases, with a small percentage of item-level picks. Given the products handled, the cases are large and bulky. And, given the urgent…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 2.82
…just industry giants. You may not put a $1,000,000+ multi-shuttle in a mid-sized company’s DC, but you can now implement AMRs. NorthShore Care Supply is an illustration of both those ideas. The company is the leader in the distribution of super-premium incontinence supplies and adult diapers, sold online for home delivery but also with a growing channel shipping to institutions. Either way, orders are stored at the case level rather than the unit level and mostly picked in cases, with a small percentage of item-level picks. Given the products handled, the cases are large and bulky. And, given the urgent…
Found in Robotics News & Content, with a score of 2.67
…solution or integrating automatic guided vehicles with a conveyor shuttle system. Outside the four walls of the warehouse, NFI is piloting a solution to develop a fully automated yard with autonomous vehicles to move trailers. “We’re taking the demand that we see in our customer portfolios, and then boiling that down to the different technologies we want to focus on,” Gress says. Learning curve There was a learning curve for both NFI and 6 River Systems, recalls Dieringer. He joined NFI from FedEx about the time the software integration was finishing up and operationalization of the robots was about to…