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BEIJING – ANYbotics AG today unveiled its ANYmal C standalone robot at the World Robot Conference. The robot is optimized with a wide range of sensors to provide high availability, safety and reliability for routine automated industrial inspections, said the Swiss company.
ANYbotics was founded in 2016 as a result of a spin-off of ETH Zurich to pave the way for the development of mobile robotics for industrial applications. The company said its stand-alone legged robots are designed to solve customer problems in harsh environments that until now have been accessible only to humans – and beyond. ANYbotics has 35 employees and has successfully tested ANYmal in various applications such as first global deployment in an offshore plant to The North Sea.
ANYmal C goes to the next step
ANYbotics said that its team, which has been manufacturing legged robots for more than 10 years, developed ANYmal C from the feet, according to industry requirements. At the heart of the company, powerful torque-adjustable actuators have been designed to carry the next-generation robot on steep stairs and reliably withstand over a million cycles, the company said.
ANYbotics said lidar and depth cameras provide a 360-degree, high-precision view of the robot's environment. Teleoperation is simplified by integrated wide angle cameras and an industrial level remote control.
The Intel i7 Hexa-core processors provide the computational power needed for advanced locomotion control, real-time mapping, standalone navigation, and integrated custom applications. These features feature a user-friendly, rugged IP67 design that is completely waterproof and dustproof, ANYbotics said.
ALL COVER C carries up to 10 kg (22 lb) payload. After two hours of use on a single battery charge, the robot connects autonomously to a docking station to recharge it.
ALL C quadruped robot C with inspection head. Source: ANYbotics
Industrial inspection with mobile robots
"Autonomous mobile robots will revolutionize industrial inspection," said ANYbotics. "In predefined missions, autonomous systems can safely and reliably navigate industrial facilities and ship sensors to collect and interpret equipment and environmental data."
To navigate the complex infrastructure of industrial facilities, the ANYbotics quadruped robot can move in steps and stairs without having to adapt its facilities. Carrying a variety of sensors such as visual and thermal cameras, lidar, microphones and gas detection sensors, ANYmal can perceive and interpret a wide range of physical properties. The system can evaluate instruments, check the status of objects, detect hot spots and detect gases, even in situations that threaten human inspectors.
ANYmal can be configured with different sensors for industrial inspections. Source: ANYbotics
Expected by the industry
The energy, oil and gas, processing and many other industries are eagerly awaiting mobile robots to improve the safety and efficiency of their operations, ANYbotics said. Because of their complexity, industrial facilities are difficult to operate without failures and, because of high downtime costs, operators are keen to avoid interruptions.
To prevent the equipment from failing, facilities must be monitored and inspected regularly, but manual data collection by human inspectors is a time-consuming and error-prone task in a potentially hazardous environment. Even if parts of the equipment are detected, problems such as leaks, rust, hot spots or missing equipment are difficult to detect. This is why autonomous mobile robots will fundamentally change operators' inspection strategy and allow for future optimization of facility architectures, said ANYbotics.
The robot report launched the Healthcare Robotics Engineering Forum, to be held December 9-10 in Santa Clara, California. The conference and exhibition will focus on improving the design, development and manufacturing of next-generation health robots. Learn more about the Healthcare Robotics Engineering Forum.
Any C ready to inspect
ANYbotic has indicated that it provides testing facilities and pilot projects around the world to prepare totally unsupervised facilities in the future.
ANYmal C is available for sale to development customers, engineering partners and universities, including full software and a simulation environment. ANYbotics said that the first ANYmal C robots will be ready for shipment before the end of the year.
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