Strategies for Implementing Collaborative Robot Applications for the Operator 4.0

Abstract

To accomplish a flexible and highly productive production system, collaborative robot applications, such as co-bots, can be one solution. Hence, last year: 2018, less than 4% of the industrial robot investments had "collaborative roots". In order to increase this number, clear strategies for the implementation of co-bots are vital. This paper will present the results from the study of 40 SMEs, and six OEMs, regarding where and when to implement co-bots in production. Furthermore, which KPIs to consider when implementing these collaborative robot applications. The Lotus Blossom technique has been used to create the first steps towards strategies for implementing collaborative robot applications for the Operator 4.0. Seven areas of application have been pre-selected, and one area has been left free of choice for the companies. The results show that the areas with greater strategic interest are 'pick-n'-place' tasks and 'load-unload' tasks.

Challenges for Manufacturing SMEs in the Introduction of Collaborative Robots

“…In [37], the authors state that cobot solutions require much work, while there are no strict standards, procedures, and steps for implementing in an enterprise. According to [24], this makes it hard for especially SMEs to understand when the cobot solution should be implemented and in which area in the manufacturing system. They mean that many companies lack the expertise and need a clear Robot & Automation strategy for a successful cobot implementation and tend to choose too complex automation tasks and too high levels of interaction.…”

“…Other challenges are related to involvement and training, including the need for education and expertise and involving the employees in the process. The literature review points out the need for skilled, educated workers to introduce new technology in manufacturing systems in general [39] and in the cobot introduction [24,40,41]. Training and education have been identified as essential factors for introducing cobots in SMEs, as well on a management level, regarding technology awareness and benefits, as on an employee level, regarding technical training and understanding the functionalities [40].…”

“…To some extent, humans and robots are sharing the workplace, even if the level of cooperation can differ. Four possible levels of interaction are coexistence, synchronization, cooperation, and collaboration [1,6,14,[23][24][25].…”

Exploration of digitalized presentation of information for Operator 4.0: Five industrial cases

“…The tasks' physical support will help the operator's capacity and ability to undertake physical activities needed for daily work, which can be characterized by multiple attributes, including the description of the physical function (e.g., ability to lift, walk, manipulate, and assemble) together with its non-functional properties (e.g., speed, strength, precision, and dexterity). Examples of Industry 4.0 enabling technologies are collaborative robot applications (Fast-Berglund & Romero, 2019), autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) (Fragapane, Ivanov, Peron, Sgarbossa, & Strandhagen, 2020) and exoskeleton (Huysamen et al, 2018). The tasks' sensorial support will help the operator's capacity and ability to acquire data from the environment, as a first step towards creating information necessary for orientation and decision-making in the operator's daily work (Romero et al, 2016b).…”

Lean Manual Assembly 4.0: A Systematic Review

“…SMEs have started their digitalization journey, but further Industry 4.0 developments need to align with the particularities of SMEs, and their organizational structures need to fully embrace and support digitalization in order to benefit from its implementation [117]. Fast-Berglund et al looked at 40 SME and 8 OEMs in order to establish collaborative robot (cobots) implementation strategies and to determine what KPIs to use for these cases [118]. The increasing penetration of intelligent machines to work alongside people and the benefits of agile production will turn SME operators into "Makers", skilled workers whose main activities are no longer assisting or monitoring machines, but creative tasks involving a wealth of information, alternatives, criteria and possible solutions [119].…”