A leading global provider of intelligent vision-guided robotics systems and services, Adept Technology GmbH systems provide performance and economic value throughout the production lifecycle, enabling PV customers to achieve precision, quality and productivity in their assembly, handling and packaging processes. PES spoke to Joachim Melis, Vice President Worldwide Sales.
PES: Intelligent automation has come a long way in recent years; what particularly excites you about the market at the moment?
Joachim Melis: Robots have been around for over four decades as we currently recognise them. But advances in encoder technology, faster processors, and new servo algorithms have lead to the latest generation of robots that not only handle products like solar cells faster, but much smoother and gentler to minimise breakage. The adoption of vision with robotic deployments continues to increase which has opened the door for robotic technology to a broader array of applications. This trend will continue, allowing PV manufacturers to deploy robotic technology faster in augmenting manual labour and replacing less flexible dedicated machinery.
PES: The company is more than 25 years old. Do you have any plans? And if you could look into your crystal ball, what does the future hold for your organisation?
JM: Adept has been a leader on numerous fronts within the robotics space. The company pioneered the use of vision to aid automation in adapting to changing products and processes. The company brought the Par Four kinematic solution (Quattro) from lab to market with unprecedented speed. The past 25 years have seen tremendous focus on hardware and controls infrastructure to improve productivity with the goal of reducing costs, improving quality and ultimately aiding users of robotics to deliver a more competitive product or service to their markets.
