industrial robots – The OM Blog by Heizer, Render, & Munson

OM in the News: Robots Bringing a Human Touch to Warehouses

“Humanoid robots are on their way to warehouses as companies start to move beyond the disembodied arms, moving trays and other machines aimed at speeding up logistics operations,” writes The Wall Street Journal (June 13, 2023).

Agility’s Digit robot has ‘eyes’ that show people where it’s going

Agility Robotics, Figure AI and Boston Dynamics are among companies designing robots more closely modeled on human beings for use in distribution centers. The new machines are being engineered with the ability to walk around warehouses, reach items high on shelves, crouch to put things down and pick up and move boxes, defying some of the prior physical limits on automation. The devices are intended to help warehouse operators mitigate labor shortfalls and eliminate the need to redesign warehouses to match the capabilities of machines.

Logistics operators have been adding automation to their warehouses for years to speed up the stacking and retrieving of goods and to take some of the most burdensome, repetitive tasks off workers. Many of the devices are designed to work in concert with employees by taking on tasks such as hauling heavy goods or bringing totes of items directly to workers. Humanoid robots take that automation a step further, seeking to stand in place of a human employee.

Agility Robotics, which has received funding from Amazon, has made a human-shaped robot called Digit that is teal, silver and black with white animated eyes. (Click here for an 11 second video).The device stands 5 feet 9 inches tall, weighs 141 pounds and can carry up to 35 pounds. Its humanlike shape gives Digit the ability to just walk into existing infrastructure and existing workflows and start to do tasks. The robot is designed to take on jobs warehouse operators have trouble hiring people to do, including repetitive roles like loading and unloading storage containers.

Some companies, seeking to address labor shortages and rising labor costs, have moved toward building warehouses that are entirely automated, known as dark warehouses. That level of automation can cost tens of millions of dollars.

The humanoid robots do need breaks, even if not for the same reasons as humans. Digit can operate for 2 hours with a 1-hour charge. That is well short of an 8-hour shift, but the machine is meant to work as part of a fleet, where two robots work while one charges.

Classroom discussion questions:

What are the advantages and disadvantages of these “humanoid robots”?
Can these robots replace warehouse workers totally?

OM in the News: An Army of Robots is Coming

A new wave of robots is arriving—and, in a world short of workers, businesses are eager to welcome them. A combination of hard-pressed employers, technological leaps (like vision systems) and improved cost effectiveness has fueled this rapid global expansion. A half-million “industrial robots” were installed globally last year, an all-time high. There are now 3.5 million in use..

This amounts to a titanic shift in the way things are made, transported and even consumed, ushering in a “roboconomy,” states The Wall Street Journal (Oct. 15-16, 2022) In the future, says WSJ, we will depend on robots to grow our food, make our goods, care for our elderly and continue to grow the global economy.

Tesla just unveiled its humanoid robot called Optimus that it plans to sell for less than $20,000 and use in car production. “It will, I think, turn the whole notion of what’s an economy on its head, at the point at which you have no shortage of labor,” said Elon Musk.

The “service” robot industry, which basically encompasses every kind of robot that isn’t bolted to the floor, is also growing at a rapid pace. These service robots include everything from autonomous cleaning robots scouring the floors of your local grocery store—nearly all Sam’s Club and Walmart already has one—to delivery robots and mobile robots taking over jobs like unloading trucks.

“Starting in 2018, many workers could no longer be counted on to show up for their after-hours cleaning shifts, and even when they did, they often weren’t doing a very good job,” says the VP of Schnuck Markets, which operates 112 supermarkets. Labor shortages worsened during the pandemic, leading Schnuck to test autonomous floor-scrubbing robots. “We used a shine meter to see how much shine we got on the floor, and it was beating the quality from human-driven scrubbers,” he says.

The convergence of three forces is driving the robot renaissance: (1) demographic trends in rich countries mean there simply aren’t enough workers; (2) robots have become more capable, more quickly, than at any other point since their earliest adoption; and (3) surging human labor costs and more-capable robots mean the amount of time it takes a new robot to pay for itself is shrinking.

Classroom discussion questions:

How else can robots be used in the service sector? (See Table 7.3 in your Heizer/Render/Munson text).
Elon Musk once said: “humans are underrated” and excessive automation at Tesla was a mistake. Why the change?

OM in the News: The Agile Robot

“Robots that can see, learn and grip different items are advancing quickly into the retail, food-and-beverage and consumer-packaged-good industries”, writes Industry Week (July 12, 2019). While deliveries of robots to the U.S. auto industry fell 12% last year, shipments to food and consumer-product companies soared 48%. And robots are needed in many industries. like warehouses, as companies struggle to find workers.

The number of jobs lost to automation is difficult to calculate, in part because one lost position often creates several others in new industries. But almost 40% of U.S. workers are in fields – retail and food service, for example – that will lose jobs to automation by 2030, according to a new McKinsey report.

Most heavy industrial robots still operate blindly and must be surrounded by cages to keep humans out of harm’s way. Any variation, such as handling objects with different sizes or textures, wasn’t possible. Now “grippers” that emulate a gecko’s sticky feet, or use soft polymers that expand to apply just the right amount of pressure, allow robots to take on new, more-nuanced tasks. Cameras let the devices see an object. Artificial intelligence helps them determine the best way to grab it.

To meet expanding needs, OnRobot makes a gripper that relies on millions of gecko-inspired tiny fibrillary stalks that adhere to an object’s surface. The firm also sells “torque-sensor” tools that apply just the right pressure for sanding or polishing.

But some tasks – say, folding clothes or loading a dishwasher – are still out of reach. “It could take 100 years to match the tiny bones, tendons and nerve endings that make the hand so versatile”, says the chairman of robot maker Yaskawa Electric.

Classroom discussion questions:

Why are agile robots a major step forward?
How might robots impact the food service industry?

OM in the News: Foxconn Replaces 60,000 Humans with Robots in China

Apple supplier Foxconn Technology has replaced 60,000 human workers with robots in a single factory, reports the South China Morning Post (May 22, 2016). This is part of a massive reduction in headcount across China’s entire Kunshan region. Foxconn has been automating its manufacturing facilities throughout China, including Kunshan, for “many years,” which it says has freed up its employees to focus on higher value-added elements of the manufacturing process, such as R&D, process control and quality control. The job cuts do not augur well for Kunshan, which has a population of 2.5 million.

”Across all of our facilities today, we are applying robotics engineering to replace repetitive tasks previously done by employees,” Foxconn said. “As our manufacturing processes and the products we produce become more technologically advanced, automation is playing an increasingly important role in our operations and we have plans to automate more of our manufacturing operations over the coming years.”

Roughly 600 companies in the Kunshan region are looking to reduce headcount with robots, as part of an effort to accelerate growth and reduce costs. While developing robotics does present higher upfront costs, machines are more predictable, stable, and cheaper over the long term versus humans. With such high pressures placed on these manufacturers, which assemble much of the world’s consumer technology products and are often under strict deadlines, it also alleviates some of the ethical issues that arise when working people too hard for too long to meet demand. Foxconn has been criticized for years for inadequate working conditions, which led to a string of suicides at its manufacturing facilities a few years ago. Foxconn employees have complained of being overworked, sleeping in less-than-ideal dormitory conditions, and not being paid fairly.

There are, by the way, currently more than 260,000 robots working in U.S. factories.

Classroom discussion questions:

How will Foxconn’s strategy impact U.S. manufacturers?
How will this decision impact China?

OM in the News: Adidas Shifts Production — But Robots Get the Jobs

Adidas unveiled a prototype of a "Speedfactory" in Ansbach, Germany this week — Adidas unveiled a prototype of a “Speedfactory” in Ansbach, Germany this week

Adidas is relocating some of its shoe production from Asia to the company’s homeland — but Germans shouldn’t expect a jobs boom, reports NBC Business News (May 25, 2016). What is currently done by hand will soon be carried out by robots as part of what the firm calls an “automated revolution.”

The sportswear giant just unveiled its prototype “Speedfactory” — a 3,000 square foot, high tech facility in the southern German town of Ansbach. The first 500 robot-made high performance running shoes are scheduled to be rolled out later this year. “We believe that this is pioneer work for a fully automated production process,” says an Adidas spokesman, adding that the facility will mean the firm “will be able to get the desired product to the customer much faster.”

Adidas moved its production to Asia in the early 1990s, mainly due to rising wage costs in Europe. It kept just one production facility open in Germany, where 700,000 soccer shoes are produced annually. Overall, Adidas manufactures more than 300 million sports shoes per year. The firm initially plans to produce around 1 million shoes in Germany.

A 50,000-square-foot “Speedfactory” is due to be finished in Ansbach by the end of 2016. A second is expected to open in the U.S. next year while a third is also in the pipeline.

Classroom discussion questions:

How does this relate to the return of manufacturing jobs in the U.S.?
What are the advantages of having such a manufacturing facility in Germany, as opposed to outsourcing to Asia?

OM in the News: The Rise of Industrial Robots

Robots will replace a growing number of jobs in industries including automotive and electronics in the next few years, particularly in east Asia, according to The Financial Times (Feb.10, 2015). Worldwide sales of industrial robots rose 23% last year and are on course to double (to 400,000) by 2018, driving radical change in many manufacturing sectors. Although robots have been used in industry for decades, recent advances in technology have cut their costs and increased their capabilities, as a new generation of reprogrammable, multipurpose machines comes into service.

The prices of industrial robots have been falling steadily, dropping about 14% in the past 4 years to $133,000 for a typical system, while capabilities have been expanding. Some robots are even cheaper: the Baxter robot from Rethink Robotics has a listed base price of $25,000, making it accessible to smaller companies that might have found it difficult to invest in earlier generations.

Advanced robots are set to cut costs and raise productivity, reducing employment in manufacturing in developed countries, while raising the skill levels demanded of the staff that remain. They are also likely to make labor costs a less significant factor for manufacturers making decisions about where to invest. In the manufacturing sectors that are the most readily automated, including cars and other transport equipment, computers and electronics and electrical equipment, about 85% of tasks can be performed by robots. Historically robots have been very rigid, and unable to apply logic to what’s in front of them, but the new generation will be applying logic to the environment and making their own decisions

The fastest adoption will come in South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand, which have heavy concentrations of the industries that are capable of high levels of automation, higher labor costs than some of their regional competitors, and limited employment protections that would prevent job cuts. Other relatively rapid adopters are expected to be China, Japan, the US, the UK and Canada. The countries likely to be slowest to embrace the new robots include more heavily regulated economies of Europe including France, Italy and Spain, as well as Brazil and India.

Classroom discussion questions:

1. Robots have been around for decades. Why the growth spurt in their use?

2. Why is SE Asia the fastest growth area?