Robotics was (possibly still is) thought to be the province of the mass manufacturer and unsuited to the production of small batches, with numerous variants, requiring many application changes.
Francois Simard, writing in The Fabricator, will convince many small manufacturers to re-appraise this notion and take another look at what robotics can do for them….
He cites a number of reasons why robotics can now cope with ‘high-product-mix environments’ that constantly need to change and re-configure.
Not only have the costs of robotics reduced significantly, which puts them within the budgets of smaller manufacturers, but their ability to adapt to differing tasks has also developed exponentially.
This has come about with the advances in AI and means that robots can be as agile as required to meet smaller manufacturers’ needs.
He explains that this is made feasible by the ability of robots to program themselves for the task ahead…
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