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KUKA robots win major prizes at the world’s largest conference for robotics and automation in Rome |
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| Augsburg/Rome May 2007 – At the world’s largest robotics conference, ICRA (International Conference on Robotics and Automation), in Rome, Augsburg-based KUKA Roboter presented their latest research and development results to more than 1500 robotics experts from around the globe. Europe’s market leader in the field of industrial robots took not just one, but two awards back to Augsburg. |
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Dr. Ralf Koeppe, head of development at KUKA Roboter, won the “IEEE RAS Early Career Award 2007” for “the conceptual design of a lightweight robot for industrial applications”. This award is presented to individuals who have made a significantly influential contribution to the field of robotics at an early stage in their career. Dr. Peter Heiligensetzer and MRK Systeme GmbH, a spin-off of KUKA Roboter GmbH, took third place in the contest for the “Invention and Entrepreneurship in Robotics and Automation Award 2007” presented by the IEEE and the IFR with their entry “KR 3 SI - Safe Human-Robot Interaction without Fences”.
It was not only KUKA Roboter GmbH’s own developments and prizes that gave the company cause to rejoice, however, but also the awards presented to long-standing cooperation partner DLR (German Aerospace Center). Professor Dr. Ing. Gerd Hirzinger, Director of the Institute for Robotics and Mechatronics at DLR, was presented with the “IEEE Robotics and Automation Technical Field Award 2007” for his achievements in the fields of mechatronics, telerobotics, human-machine interaction and space robotics. The research results obtained with the two-arm robot “Justin” at the same institute and documented in a video were rewarded with the “ICRA Best Video Award 2007”. | |
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| Award-winning development projects | | |
| Both the KUKA lightweight robot and the KR 3 SI can work in close cooperation with humans and are developments of which the company is particularly proud, as they represent a further step along the road to service robotics.
KUKA Roboter GmbH presented the lightweight robot, developed in cooperation with DLR, at an exhibition accompanying the conference. At this exhibition, with the motto “Research, Education, Robotics – doing it better!”, the interested audience of industry insiders had the opportunity to find out for themselves just how easy it is to program the KUKA lightweight robot. The company also presented a KR 3 training cell with force/torque sensor applications and the visualization of the invisible using “Augmented Reality”. This is a technology package that projects information from the robot controller into the operator’s field of view, thereby considerably simplifying the work of setting up, commissioning and programming a complex robot system. Compatible with all KUKA robots, this technology package is of particular interest for research and teaching.
A third exhibit from KUKA Roboter also addressed precisely the same target fields. Based on the Robotics Studio developed by Microsoft, KUKA demonstrated an application in which it was possible to move the lightweight robot using both a real sensor and a virtual sensor as part of a physics simulation. In the medium term, KUKA hopes to offer computer programming tools based on this technology to enable pupils and students to acquire knowledge of robotics using KUKA robots. Teaching staff can also use these documents and integrate them into their lessons. | |
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