Robotics & Automation News

Market trends and business perspectives

training

Yaskawa’s robotics training academy cultivates automation skills in South Africa

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By Leon Coetzer, training officer at Yaskawa South Africa

Robotics is an ever-growing industry, and South African manufacturers are increasingly adopting automation into their production processes to remain competitive.

Yaskawa’s long-standing training academy offers its customers, as well as individuals looking to enter the industry, the opportunity to learn and upskill in various in-demand positions, including programming, operations, maintenance, safety, and robot troubleshooting.

Leon Coetzer, training officer at Yaskawa, says: “At the Yaskawa Southern Africa Training Academy, we offer a variety of courses and training programs designed to meet the needs of different skill levels, from beginner to advanced. [Read more…] about Yaskawa’s robotics training academy cultivates automation skills in South Africa

How Generative AI can transform businesses

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Generative AI is a branch of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technique that is used to generate new contents regarding images, text, music, or even video.

These techniques are based on deep learning models, particularly generative models, which aim to learn patterns and structures from existing data and then generate new examples that are similar to the training data.

One of the most common types of generative models used in AI is the Generative Adversarial Network (GAN). The training process of a GAN involves a competition between the generator and the discriminator. [Read more…] about How Generative AI can transform businesses

HR Onboarding: The Most Important Step in Employee Retention

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The process of HR onboarding is one of the most crucial steps when it comes to employee retention. After all, it’s the first impression a new hire gets from their employer, and it lays the foundation for how they view their job and their relationship with their employer. As such, employers need to ensure that they’re providing an effective onboarding program to help ensure employees stay with the company for years to come. [Read more…] about HR Onboarding: The Most Important Step in Employee Retention

LionsBot launches ‘world’s first Zero Click cleaning robots’

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LionsBot International, which says its cleaning robots are in operation in more than 30 countries, has unveiled three new products – the R3 Vac, R3 Scrub Pro and the MagicTag.

The company says the new products “revolutionise autonomous professional cleaning”. Both the R3 Vac and R3 Scrub Pro are professional-grade vacuuming and scrubbing robots respectively, while the MagicTag enables both LionsBots to become “Zero Click” and very easy to use.

Currently, there is a global shortage of professional cleaners. However, most professional cleaning robots still require users to undergo extensive training before using the robot. Coupled with the high turnover rate experienced in the cleaning industry, this is not practical. [Read more…] about LionsBot launches ‘world’s first Zero Click cleaning robots’

5 Common Staff Organization Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

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Failing to properly organize staff is one of the biggest reasons companies get into trouble. They struggle to overcome employee management issues and end up being less successful than they hoped.

What causes this to happen?

Well, you’re about to find out. This post explores some common staff organization mistakes you’re probably making right now and how to avoid them. Often, it is just simple things that cause you to fall off the bandwagon and lose your ability to coordinate what’s happening in your organization. [Read more…] about 5 Common Staff Organization Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

ABB launches ‘complete’ robot training package to prepare students for future work

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Package includes easy-to-use GoFa collaborative robot cell, 56 hours of teaching materials and globally recognized STEM certification

ABB Robotics is aiming to “close the global education gap in automation” and prepare students for the future of work with the launch of a ready-to-use education package. Comprising a GoFa collaborative robot (cobot), teaching materials and a globally recognized technical qualification, the package is part of ABB Robotics global campaign to help workers thrive in a new era of automation. 

The ABB Robotics Education Package has been created to ensure educational establishments can provide highly skilled young people for companies looking to benefit from robotic automation.

Although some 80 percent of global educators see automation shaping employment in the next 10 years, only one in four education institutes incorporate robotics into their curriculum. Barriers include the lack of teachers trained in robotics and automation and the difficulty in incorporating robotics training into the curriculum seamlessly. [Read more…] about ABB launches ‘complete’ robot training package to prepare students for future work

5 Excellent Ways You Can Make Employee Engagement More Accessible

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Adequately engaging and motivating employees has been a core focus for businesses of all sizes since the dawn of corporate history. It’s common knowledge that happy, engaged workers are essential to a thriving business environment.

However, until recently, employee engagement has had relatively low accessibility due to high labor costs or complex workflows. Fortunately, technological advancements have opened up new possibilities that make creating an atmosphere of engagement easier with minimal cost or effort.

In this blog post, we’ll be looking at five excellent ways you can use workflow background information to make employee engagement more accessible than ever before. [Read more…] about 5 Excellent Ways You Can Make Employee Engagement More Accessible

The Challenges and Potential of Computer-Generated Images

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) has transformed the way we approach many aspects of our lives, and one area where it is making a significant impact is in image generation.

With the ability to produce highly realistic and original images, AI has opened up new possibilities for artistic expression, scientific research, and commercial applications.

However, the process of generating AI images is not without its challenges, from biases and incomplete data to the potential for unpredictable or surreal results. [Read more…] about The Challenges and Potential of Computer-Generated Images

Drones navigate unseen environments with liquid neural networks

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MIT researchers exhibit a new advancement in autonomous drone navigation, using brain-inspired liquid neural networks that excel in out-of-distribution scenarios

In the vast, expansive skies where birds once ruled supreme, a new crop of aviators is taking flight. These pioneers of the air are not living creatures, but rather a product of deliberate innovation: drones.

But these aren’t your typical flying bots, humming around like mechanical bees. Rather, they’re avian-inspired marvels that soar through the sky, guided by liquid neural networks to navigate ever-changing and unseen environments with precision and ease.

Inspired by the adaptable nature of organic brains, researchers from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory introduced a method for robust flight navigation agents to master vision-based fly-to-target tasks in intricate, unfamiliar environments. [Read more…] about Drones navigate unseen environments with liquid neural networks

IDS offers its industrial camera users free update to its new deep learning method

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IDS Imaging Development Systems is offering an update for the AI system IDS NXT: Cameras can now also detect anomalies

In quality assurance, it is often necessary to reliably detect deviations from the norm. Industrial cameras have a key role in this, capturing images of products and analysing them for defects.

If the error cases are not known in advance or are too diverse, however, rule-based image processing reaches its limits. By contrast, this challenge can be reliably solved with the AI method Anomaly Detection.

The new, free IDS NXT 3.0 software update from IDS Imaging Development Systems makes the method available to all users of the AI vision system with immediate effect. [Read more…] about IDS offers its industrial camera users free update to its new deep learning method