Ivan Hernandez Dalas - Mechatronics

The R4 robot is designed to help vineyard, orchard and specialty crop growers overcome sector challenges. | Source: CNH Industrial 2026 has been a tumultuous year for farmers in America. Global trade wars mean farmers’ supplies are growing more expensive, while many crop prices have dropped. At the same time, changing weather conditions mean getting a good harvest is increasingly tricky. These pressures result in a need for a change in how we farm, and robotics could be the answer. Luca Ferrari, a senior manager of robotics a breakthrough technologies at CNH Industrial, said labor availability, costs, productivity, and efficiency are common concerns from the company ‘s customers. “Our users need to get more done with fewer resources. They want something, and we see it with robotics but not just robotics, that is solving a real problem, that is easy to use, and that can create value,” he told The Robot Report . “Labor availability is one of the main challenges that our far...

Claire chatted to Aaron Edsinger from Hello Robot about their Stretch robots that can help people with mobility issues live more independently. Aaron Edsinger is CEO and Co-Founder of Hello Robot , a robotics company dedicated to developing practical, safe, and accessible robots for people. With a passion for building robots and robot companies, Aaron has founded four companies focused on bringing human collaborative robots to the consumer, manufacturing, healthcare and research markets. As Robotics Director at Google, he led the business, product and technical development of two of Google’s central investments in robotics, and helped to define the overall robotics strategy. View Source

Deborah Lupton / Pop Chips / Licenced by CC-BY 4.0 Intrinsic (an AI robotics group at Google) announced that the company is making parts of its platform open source. Intrinsic Core is a set of ROS-compatible capabilities for building sophisticated robotic applications. The capabilities included in the open source package are as follow: Intrinsic Control . A hardware-agnostic, real-time control framework that delivers sensor-based control. It allows the robot to dynamically adapt its behavior mid-trajectory based on changes in the environment. It is designed to deliver efficient, collision-free paths. The idea is that users can swap out different robot arms, grippers, sensors, and more without needing to rewrite drivers. Pose estimation . Provides an accurate six degrees of freedom pose estimation of 3D parts. Motion planning . Logic auto-generates efficient paths while avoiding collisions. Grasp planning . Designed to enable various grippers to automatically and dynamically ...

Many of the biggest challenges in automation don’t come from component performance, but from how systems are put together. Source: Kollmorgen When machine builders are specifying motion systems, it is easy to get caught up on the numbers. Torque, speed, power density, and price are all clear, measurable factors, and they provide a straightforward way to compare components. But in modern machine design, these figures rarely tell the full story. In practice, many of the biggest challenges in automation do not come from component performance, but from how systems are put together. Integration, commissioning, and troubleshooting often determine whether a machine is delivered on time and performs as intended. As a result, choosing the right motion architecture is less about selecting the most capable individual components and more about understanding how the entire system will behave in use. The hidden cost of engineering time One of the most overlooked factors in motion system de...

The AX6 force- and power-limited robot arm is designed to be lightweight and easy to use. Source: Epson Epson Robots this week expanded its six-axis robot line with the AX6 collaborative robot. It said the new cobot is is designed with power- and force-limiting features that, with a proper risk assessment, can allow operation alongside people without traditional safety barriers. “Collaborative robots have lowered the barriers to entry for many new robot users by simplifying programming and integration, while enabling new applications where space and user interaction are critical,” stated Rick Brookshire, director for product and robot development at Epson. “With the introduction of the AX6, Epson can now address these applications while offering customers a complete range of robotic safety solutions.” Suwa, Japan-based Epson Robots said it is the global leader in SCARA robots. With four decades of experience, it provides systems based on a common PC platform for precision asse...

ANYmal can now inspect more of facilities in processing industries. Source: ANYbotics Closed doors have been a barrier for mobile inspection robots in processing industries such as energy, metals, mining, and chemicals. ANYbotics today said it has partnered with dormakaba and LEGIC Identsystems AG to add automated door-access capabilities to its ANYmal robot fleet. “Inspection only delivers value if the robot can reach the asset, and a closed door was the one obstacle that stopped our robots from covering the most critical parts of a plant,” said Jacob Euler-Rolle, product manager, workflow integration, at ANYbotics. “Solving it with LEGIC and dormakaba means ANYmal can now inspect where it matters most, without rebuilding any infrastructure.” “Our customers do not buy robots; they buy a solution to their operational challenges: less unplanned downtime and fewer people in hazardous areas,” stated Péter Fankhauser, co-founder and CEO of ANYbotics. ...