Feature: Industrial electronics
What’s often lost in the conversation, however, is how best to incorporate measures that allow humans and Cobots to work together safely and harmoniously, in particular as these industrial partners operate in ever closer physical proximity
Functional Safety Takes a More Prominent Role in Cobot Design In the early days of NexCOBOT, functional safety (FuSa) was more of an afterthought for industrial manufacturers. As the sector began to become more heavily automated, however, standards and regulatory bodies such as ISO began looking more closely to ensure a safe industrial operating environment. NexCOBOT was in the right place at the right time. ‘In the very beginning, there were
few requirements,’ Shern says. ‘Some of our customers were aware that new ISO safety standards for industrial robots were coming, but it wasn't very prevalent at that point. At the same
time, though, we had an innovative program with a partner in Germany to release a complete functional safety solution. So, we were ready, and as we moved along we saw more and more customers asking for our solutions.’
Renesas Technology Helps Accelerate FuSa Adoption NexCOBOT began working with Renesas in 2022 to design a digital safety IO interface and has since adopted Renesas RX MCUs and RZ MPUs as well as pre-certified FuSa solution kits and self-test libraries. While industrial systems typically entail a longer design process than the consumer market, Shern
says customers are now asking for greenfield FuSa designs and working prototypes faster than ever. Renesas’ one-stop functional safety solution for general-purpose processors is responding to the challenge by helping NexCOBOT reduce FuSa development by as much as two-thirds, from six years to two. ‘We found that Renesas provides a
very complete, comprehensive FuSa solution for embedded systems,’ Shern says. ‘Usually, if you look at FuSa for embedded systems, customers are going to one vendor for a hardware chipset, another for the real-time OS software and a third for the full safety library. It quickly becomes a pain to integrate all of these bits and pieces. Renesas offers a comprehensive service which makes our lives a lot easier and our projects a lot easier to implement.’ We look forward to our continued
collaboration with NexCOBOT to advance industry safety standards and foster deeper, and more productive, working relationships between humans and robots. Together we are enabling a new era in advanced industrial automation.
www.electronicsworld.co.uk September 2024 13
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