Cobots: Reviving the post-pandemic industries

THE coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic exacerbated existing challenges and exposed new vulnerabilities for manufacturers around the world.

The serious disruption to supply chains, sudden material shortages and steep swings in demand left manufacturers grappling with changes. Labor-intensive manufacturing has been hit adversely by Covid-19 measures of extended lockdowns and physical distancing.

But such measures present an opportunity for labor-centric manufacturers to rethink their operations on ways to keep production going while adhering to regulatory measures without sacrificing cost efficiency, and to future-proof operations for more resilience. Collaborative robots also called cobots can be part of the rethinking process.

At the first Meet the Cobot Leaders session on October 6, sponsored by Universal Robots, the “live” online interactive forum focused on the encompassing role of cobots. Leading cobot luminaries Jürgen von Hollen, president of Universal Robots; James McKew, regional director of Asia-Pacific of Universal Robots; and Dr. Che Fai Yeong, director of DF Automation and Robotics and associate professor at the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, answered important questions fielded by industry practitioners and attendees online on how manufacturers in the Asia-Pacific can be future-ready.

Selected highlights of the Meet The Leaders question-and-answer session revealed the vital role cobots would play in recovering the business momentum lost to the

Covid-19 spread, as follows:

DR. YEONG, MODERATOR: Can you share some of the recent case studies where Universal Robots helped a company to transform its business in APAC?

JAMES MCKEW: Absolutely, I’d like to say it’s really exciting for us to see Nanyang Technology University earlier in the pandemic collaborate with us and our partners and our AGV mobile robot as well in solving another labor variability issue. You see, labor in Singapore was difficult to come across during the pandemic. A lot of the available labor didn’t want to be exposed to potential cross contamination from Covid.

In the Nanyang University case, we used liquid or mist disinfection or some form of disinfectant to sanitize public spaces. At Nanyang Technology University, we were able to deploy the solution with the UR robot arm on an AGV, It’s been a revelation for us to see what we can do with automation or collaborative automation inhouse versus a simple decision to outsource an activity.

YEONG: Moving forward, Covid has affected many of us, not only in manufacturing but also in other industries. During this post pandemic, do you see any changes in the trend of robot utilization in manufacturing or even creation of new markets or even new industries?

MCKEW: Good question, and I think that there are two distinct parts in the answer. One part of that is the rise of new industries and I think we talked about the Nanyang University and collaboration in Singapore in that context. I also think UR has similar collaborations in Europe and the Americas. I also understand Taiwan has a unique experience using a nasal swabbing robotic application using UR robots for Covid detection.

Obviously, we don’t know what the future for Covid looks like. Still, in the post Covid period, I think industries will continue to have new opportunities. One of other applications we have been developing is the sterilization of airline seats using robot arms. There’s a lot of innovation coming into that space and again if you think about it, applications that deploy robots make sense today to avoid exposing humans to injuries from repetitive strenuous activities or worst, Covid infections.

On the SME (small- to mediumsized enterprise) front, we’ve been asked why we haven’t gotten the traction we would like to have, It’s not that we haven’t gotten the traction. I think a lot of SME owners are rather frightened at the potential costs of a robot. On the other hand, I also think Covid is making UR and our people better making business owners understand the value proposition of robots.

For many businesses in the region, floor space is expensive, much more expensive than people. And as we’re able to explain that a cobot can help in distancing, so you can use your current floor space to get back to the same productive potential as before. If you get the application right, higher levels of production will happen which will then allow company to bring back as many people onto the production floor as physical distancing guidelines will allow.

Now, as we start to have that kind of conversation, questions come whether robots will replacing people. We say we don’t want robots unnecessarily replacing people. But if robots can help factories reopen, stay open, stay profitable, we would hope that people whom robots displaced can be deployed to more creative, value-added alternatives.

YEONG: Spot on, James. I think my next question is a very general one. From UR’s perspective, which industry does UR will increase its cobot uptake?

JüRGEN VON HOLLEN: I think one of the things, maybe just going back a bit on what’s happening with the pandemic and everything else, I — as chief executive, president of the company — I’m going through the same kind of pain trying to forecast what’s going to happen, three, six months out, it’s almost... So, I think, based on what we’ve been seeing so far, the medical industry, which was not a really huge industry for us, has grown dramatically during the pandemic For the most part, that’s due to restrictions in many countries, that only businesses that had a medical purpose were allowed to stay open in many places, and that’s where we saw a lot of customers and partners actually shift quickly to offer medical equipment which they couldn’t or were not doing before.

This underlies how flexible the infrastructure is when you’re using our cobots. That’s why we see a big increase in demand in the medical, pharmaceutical industry. But we also see other industries like food and beverage and definitely the automotive industry growing comparatively faster than the rest when it comes to adoption of collaborative automation.