Cobots: No more than Trojan Horses for Industrial Robots?

Interview between "automationspraxis" magazine and robotics expert Heiko Röhrig from EGS Automation, who comments critically on the cobot trend:

Will cobots really dominate the future? When walking trade shows, visiting recognized forums, or reading reports in industry media, the answer seems clear: Yes, cobots, or collaborative robots, are everywhere.

I have been in the robotics industry for almost 25 years now and a (supposed) boom has never looked so certain before. From my memory, the whole cobot trend started with Kuka's LBR around the 2000s, although at the time I perceived it as a special-purpose lightweight robot with force-moment sensor technology, and not as a cobot. Then Universal Robots (UR) entered the market around 2010. This was the start for a steadily growing and now almost unmanageable excess of cobot manufacturers. At the same time, the established industrial robot manufacturers are following the trend by launching new cobot models themselves.

However, if you do not just attend trade fairs, but also visit factory floors and production facilities, you will see a contrasting picture. Almost all robots in the field work behind fences or are separated from humans by protective devices - including the largest proportion of cobots! Truly collaborative operation is an absolute rarity. Furthermore, a considerable proportion of cobot applications, mostly built in a do-it-yourself mode without suitable expertise, pose a significant injury risk to employees.
Additionally, when compared with industrial robots of similar quality, cobots are not more cost-effective as necessary force-torque sensors must also be installed on each axis. They are, however, easier to operate and program. Cobot manufacturers have made a virtue out of necessity: It was impossible to catch up with the established industrial robot manufacturers in a short time, but they have done a great job of mapping the significantly smaller range of functions onto simple user interfaces. Thus, they allow to think of operation in a new and more modern way without having to take existing operators and their habits into consideration.

As an automation specialist, you are caught between the marketing promises of the cobot manufacturers and the end users who expect all the promised benefits including operation alongside humans, safety according to industry standards, as well as maximum output and best possible ROI. Most cobot requests end up in normal industrial robot installations - partly because a collaborative robot is simply not required for most of these requests. This background raises the suspicion that established robot manufacturers may only offer cobots to be considered for corresponding requests and then mostly end up with an industrial robot solution.

My conclusion: If there really were a significant number of collaborative applications - and if the standards and safety requirements permit an economic realization – then the cobot trend pushed by large marketing budgets would become established. Currently, however, I have the impression that it is more of a market trend than a sustainable industry movement. It also seems to me that the established industrial robot manufacturers primarily offer cobots to be considered for corresponding inquiries but succeed with traditional industrial robots at the end. If the cobot trend weakens or ends, they would still be in business with the industrial robot models - in contrast to the numerous pure cobot suppliers trying to establish themselves alongside well-known market leaders…

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