Autonomous navigation and AGV fleet management leader BlueBotics – whose ANT navigation technology drives over 5,000 AGVs and AMRs around the world – has expanded the scope of its popular ANT server mission and fleet management software by adding compatibility with the German AGV interoperability standard VDA 5050.
Pramac and BlueBotics have announced their partnership, which sees BlueBotics providing ANT navigation technology and fleet management software for Pramac’s new line of X-ACT mobile logistics robots.
Driven by advances in battery-powered vehicles, industries including material handling, mining, construction, and agriculture are actively embracing the all-electric dream.
BlueBotics, the global leader natural feature navigation, is co-exhibiting with parent company ZAPI GROUP at CeMAT Asia 2023, the international trade show for intralogistics solutions and warehousing solutions, taking place in Shanghai on October 23-27.
The Prix BlueBotics recognises a Master’s Student at EPFL who has demonstrated excellence in, and contributed to the advancement of scientific or technical research in the field of robotics.
More than 70 percent of respondents plan to extend fleets within the next two years, most by three or more vehicles, according to a new global mobile robotics market survey.
Automation technology has come a long way. But what about the future of AGVs and AMRs?
The first AGVs in the 1950s ran on rails or were guided by wires. While advanced for the time, these AGVs were replaced in the 1970s by magnetic guidance, and surpassed in the 1990s by laser guidance. Natural navigation technology (such as ANT) disrupted the field in the early 2000s.
But what comes next?
A hybrid forklift seems to offer the functionality of both a manual forklift and its fully automatic equivalent.
Karter (a subsidiary of Weighpack) has released three new ANT driven autonomous mobile robots (AMR) targeted at a wide range of applications – from intralogistics and manufacturing to agriculture and the transportation of heavy products and components.
ANT everywhere, a new product extension by the Swiss autonomous navigation leader, enables a new era of AGV & AMR operations by making outdoor vehicle missions just as robust and precise as those indoors.