According to Forbes, 62 percent of startups go out of business due to partnership problems arising between co-founders. Entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley therefore know that it is crucial to explore candidates for partners to find those who would be the best fit – complementing each other with different strengths and weaknesses.
Companies that want to adopt collaborative robots (cobots) also share similar challenges. Because cobots and workers form a sense of partnership, sharing the same workplace and collaborating on the same projects, it is necessary for companies to take a careful look at cobots before they decide which one is the most suitable.
The development of industrial robots has been centered solely around productivity for more than half a century. Cobots, however, are different. They originated from an idea that robots and workers can collaborate both efficiently and safely in the same place. This difference means that cobots need to be safe partners for workers to collaborate, sophisticated artisans to lessen the burden of workers and easy-to-use machines to be installed and managed onsite.
With all that, it’s important for companies who would like to adopt cobots to establish guidelines before acquiring one. Below is the list of three essential criteria for those who seek to find their best cobot partners.
1. Is it safe enough to work with people?
According to the Global Robotics Report by Toshiba Machine Industrial Robots, 79.3 percent of cobot customers were not aware of their cobot’s safety standards. On the other hand, when buying an electronic device, people check whether the device has safety/quality labeling (KC in Korea), energy efficiency rating and what country it is from. For some uses, people even check whether it has met Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive (RoHS) standards. Similar procedures are also necessary for cobots as safety is crucial, considering how they directly work with humans.
Companies need to thoroughly examine whether cobots comply with safety requirements for international standards such as ISO 10218 and ISO/TS 15066. If a cobot is compliant with ISO 10218, it means that its safety system is qualified to pass regulations of numerous countries. And if a cobot satisfies ISO/TS 15066, it means that a safe collaboration between cobots and workers is ensured.
Furthermore, some cobots have voluntarily enacted safety standards that exceed the minimum levels required in ISO 10218, such as Doosan Robotics’ cobots. Doosan cobots have not only attained the minimum level of PL d, Cat 3 required from ISO 10218, but are certified with the highest level in ISO, PL e, Cat 4 for emergency stop function. Considering that the emergency stop function is one of the most important safety features for workers, Doosan has devoted itself to going one step further to better ensure worker safety. In sum, a total of 18 functions, including industry-highest safety features, have met the criteria of ISO/TS 15066, fully ensuring that Doosan cobots and humans can collaborate safely.
● What is PL e and Cat 4?
Performance Level (PL) measures how likely it is for a control system including safety-related parts to malfunction. Structure Category (Cat) is a term that specifies the ability of safety-related parts to perform a safety function under foreseeable conditions. Therefore, the higher the PL value, the more stable the system is; the higher the Cat value, the more likely it is for faults to be detected in advance.
A high value for Cat means that the safety system has a more sophisticated ability to monitor faults. Simply put, a safety system certified with Cat 3 ensures minimum operation with basic monitoring features by having a dual-channel system. Cat 4, one level above Cat 3 and the most advanced safety standard, ensures an always-on availability of the function by giving additional feedback to workers after continuous monitoring. This is similar to how a car notifies a driver when one of its headlamps is out by lighting up an icon on the dashboard. The safety system, in particular the emergency stop function on Doosan cobots has been certified with PL e, Cat 4. By receiving the industry’s highest safety certification, Doosan cobots have a comparatively lower possibility of malfunctioning. Human partners working with Doosan robots become aware of the situation whenever unexpected failures occur.
Doosan Robotics is doing its best to offer the industry’s highest level of safety to consumers and to ensure this safety through constant research and investment. In addition, Doosan participated in the ISO 10218 amendment procedure and is actively contributing to establishing cobot safety standards.
2. Is it sophisticated enough to perform complicated applications?
When companies are looking for cobots, they take into account the payload, load capacity and sensors, considering which applications the robot would serve. Identifying sensors is especially important because they change the level of sophistication.
Every task requires a different level of sophistication for cobot dexterity. Usually, the level is deemed higher if the tasks cannot be standardized into a pattern. Human workers have the dexterity to apply different weight depending on product, workplace and the shape of objects. Doosan cobots can also apply a similar level of dexterity when performing tasks for applications.
Compared to other cobots, Doosan cobots are capable of performing sophisticated tasks that require high dexterity enabled by their six joint torque sensors, which allow Doosan cobots to detect external forces with high sensitivity. Even for applications without patterned processes, Doosan cobots perform precise and dexterous works with stability assured. With their force control and compliance control, they can be adopted for applications that entail not only simple and repetitive assembly but also those that require human dexterity. As experienced human workers produce sophisticated outcomes, Doosan cobots can also work with a level of dexterity that is similar to or even actually exceeds human dexterity.
For instance, polishing is a process that depends largely on the force applied on surfaces. A cobot without force control is not able to produce human worker-level of outcome—the level of shining differs. However, a Doosan cobot, with its force control and compliance control, produces exquisitely sophisticated shining surfaces as it provides delicate and consistent exertion of force. In the industrial worksite, even a simple and repetitive task such as polishing requires a certain amount of consistent force for dexterity.
Through six torque sensors, Doosan cobots feature force control and compliance control. This essential technology allows Doosan cobots to provide a wide range of applications in different workspaces. This is why companies need to consider the level of sophistication a cobot can provide.
3. Is it easy enough to be used immediately after quick install?
One of the major big differences between cobots and industrial robots is that the cobot does not require professional robot programming. Anyone can easily install and operate it on the day of its arrival. In the past, only professional coders that had the ability to use programming languages were able to activate robots. Their contribution was essential with more than 15,000 programming languages being developed every day. In contrast, cobots are convenient and easy-to-use as they are freed from such conventional difficulties.
Additionally, Doosan Robotics has developed an intuitive user experience on Teach Pendant (a device to control a cobot). Skills that are frequently used—pick and place, palletizing, inserting a hole—are programmed in advance to be used as icons. The access to these icons allows Doosan cobots to be easy and efficient workers for applications.
Doosan cobots can be easily controlled with Direct Control Unit, which is equipped with five buttons that a worker can press to control movement and end-location. This allows workers to teach cobots’ movement directly through an easy button-control. Also with Doosan cobots’ Smart Setup feature, cobots can measure the angle of install sites and the weight of tools. These features even allow workers without special expertise in programming and coding to install and operate a Doosan cobot within 12 minutes after delivery.
Do you want to foster a perfect partnership with cobots? Please see below the graphic news that summarizes the points to consider before purchasing cobots.
