ROBO-PARTNER: Seamless Human-Robot Cooperation for Intelligent, Flexible and Safe Operations in the Assembly Factories of the Future

TLDR

ROBO‑PARTNER seeks to merge advanced industrial automation with human skills to enable safe, hybrid assembly operations that combine robot strength, precision, and speed with human intelligence. The project delivers intuitive human‑robot interfaces, fenceless safety strategies, planning tools, mobile robot assistants, and a distributed ontology‑based architecture, validated in an automotive pilot case.

Abstract

This paper presents the vision and architectures, proposed by the EU project ROBO-PARTNER. The project aspires to the integration of the latest industrial automation systems for assembly operations, in combination with human capabilities. Focus is given to combining robot strength, velocity, predictability, repeatability and precision with human intelligence and skills to get at a hybrid solution that would be involving the safe cooperation of operators with autonomous and adapting robotic systems. The main enablers are: the development of intuitive interfaces for safe human-robot cooperation (HRC), the use of safety strategies and equipment, allowing fenceless human robot assembly cells, the introduction of methods and tools for the efficient planning programming and execution of assembly operations, as well as the use of mobile robots, acting as assistants to human operators. The project also provides a more flexible integration and communication architecture by utilizing a distributed computing model along with ontology services. A pilot case from the automotive industry is used as the ground for developing and testing the aforementioned technologies.