The German Engineering Federation (VDMA) is pleased with the AI-robotics joint project RoX: “RoX is part of a family of forward-looking projects that have set themselves the goal of developing the data economy in Germany and Europe,” says Hartmut Rauen, deputy managing director of the VDMA: ”The potential is considerable, especially when advanced topics such as data rooms meet innovative AI- and cloud-based robotic solutions.”

Leveraging the potential of the growing robotics market

To fully exploit the potential of the growing robotics market, the RoX project is taking robotic systems to a new level of performance by combining advanced robotic components, artificial intelligence (AI) and a digital ecosystem. The aim is to shorten innovation cycles and significantly accelerate system integration and commissioning.

RoX initiative is of outstanding importance

Dr. Horst Heinol-Heikkinen, member of the board of the VDMA Robotics + Automation Association, says: “This initiative, launched by the German Chancellor's Future Council, is of outstanding importance. The focus here is on users, who are empowered to efficiently implement innovation leaps with AI-based robotics. The open ecosystem of RoX lowers existing barriers to internal and external collaboration, while users always retain sovereignty over their data.”

Consortium of business and science

Since, in the opinion of those responsible, no single market participant can master the high complexity of AI-based robotic systems alone, a consortium of industry and science is cooperating in RoX. The focus here is on practice-relevant use cases that address the current need for action in manufacturing companies as well as in the logistics and service sectors and offer innovative, transferable solutions. The central application areas include loading and unloading processes along the entire logistics chain, picking processes in unstructured environments, multifunctional and location-flexible robot systems in production, and AI-based commissioning of robot systems. In these areas, the feasibility and practicality of the developed solutions are demonstrated and evaluated for their potential for continuous further development and scalability.

Digital ecosystem for AI-based robotics

To develop a scalable digital ecosystem for AI-based robotics, RoX focuses on the integration of practice-oriented solutions in development and application environments, the provision of quality-assured software components and AI models, and the design of semantic models and meta-data structures. Data security of the robotics ecosystem and networking with international initiatives are also being worked on as an integral part of the project. The sustainable organizational structure ensures that the developed software components, semantic models and digital ecosystem will be provided and further developed beyond the end of the project.

The members of the RoX consortium

RoX consortium members include ABB AG, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma GmbH & Co. KG, the German Aerospace Center (DLR), DFKI, Fiege Logistik Stiftung & Co. KG, Gluth Systemtechnik GmbH, RIF Institut für Forschung und Transfer e.V., Intrinsic Innovation GmbH, Invite GmbH, Mercedes-Benz AG, Roboception GmbH, Robomotion GmbH, Schunk SE & Co. KG, Sotec GmbH & Co. KG, T-Systems International GmbH, VDMA Robotics + Automation, Wacker Chemie AG, Adolf Würth GmbH & Co. KG, Yardstick Robotics GmbH, Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation IPA, Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics IML, Dürr Systems AG, Rheinmetall Waffe Munition GmbH, Safelog GmbH and Siemens AG. The consortium is led by ABB, Siemens, DLR and Fraunhofer IPA.

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