Waldkirch, June 2018 – In the future, SICK will increasingly focus on system business in addition to sensors. This will become clear on at the Automatica trade fair in Munich from June 19- 22, 2018: SICK will be presenting its entire range of turnkey solutions for industrial automation for the first time. The successful product portfolio for logistics and process automation has been expanded to include complete solutions for the application areas of safety systems, vision, RFID and Industry 4.0, which are also considered important stimuli for automation concepts in robotics. As the leading sensor supplier in the world of automation, SICK is continuing on the path to becoming a provider of customer-specific application solutions and is providing customers with decades of experience in technology and applications as well as extensive project management and integration services to customers from all industries and of all company sizes. The option of simultaneously integrating several technologies such as vision and safety into individual applications makes SICK a technological trailblazer for cooperative and collaborative human-robot scenarios which are becoming more and more common.
The scope of the customer-specific solutions from SICK begins with the initial acceptance of the individual tasks and framework conditions of an application, encompasses complete clarification and planning of the required sensors, controls, software and hardware components and ranges to complete implementation in the form of completely equipped and operationally ready application solutions including individual, mechanical and electrical integration. Additional consultation services from experts of the respective area of application, for example Safety Solutions, can optimize the solution past the actual customer requirements – another unique selling point of SICK.
Customers who decide on turkey solutions from SICK can concentrate on their own core competencies. They profit from efficient and experienced product management from a single source - with only one contact person, maximum planning security, short project runtimes and comprehensive project documentation. Hardware and software interfaces - and thereby project and implementation risks - are minimized, even if SICK integrates specified components from other manufacturers into its solutions. In operation, the solutions impress with their excellent functionality and availability as well as their ability to migrate at any time and adapt to future needs, should the requirements change at some point.
Turnkey solutions using the example of robot visual guidance
The more complex the tasks in industrial automation are, the more factors influence the ideal solutions. This also applies for the implementation of vision applications in robotics, for instance with the automated application of glue beads, welding seam inspection or bin picking. Turnkey vision function cells from SICK - based on the technical specifications and specification sheet agreed on with the customer - cover all sub-aspects of highly functional and highly-available complete solutions. Image processing systems, vision sensors, illumination and mechanical components for integration into existing systems solve the basic tasks - no matter whether they concern the measurement of dimensions, the reading of codes or plain text, the inspection of object features or the detection of the position of parts on a belt or in a bin. With robot visual guidance, SICK can also integrate the robots as well as conveyor modules for supplying and taking away parts or load carriers into the function cell and connect these to the environment both mechanically and electrically. Binary sensors such as photoelectric sensors trigger the respective transport, handling and inspection processes within the application solution - and the integration of innovative 3D sensors from SICK allows for the implementation of even challenging 3D applications.
Visual guidance of a robot, as well as countless other vision solutions, are used to an increasing degree in processes in which machines cooperate or collaborate with robots. SICK also offers turnkey safety solutions for these scenarios which can be implemented either individually or with a vision concept. Certified safety experts from SICK complete the solution package for the application from risk analysis to CE marking. Due to the wide range of safety-related safety sensors, controls and services, tactile and electro-sensitive protective devices can be implemented ergonomically and appropriately for automation, and human-robot collaboration applications can be monitored for safety.
The customer thereby gets two turnkey solutions from a single source for the same robot visual guidance use case in one entire project - one vision and one safety solution. Should it be necessary to integrate the overall application of the safety-monitored robot visual guidance solution into an RFID-supported operating data management system or into an Industry 4.0 environment, SICK also offers individually tailored application solutions.
SICK is one of the world’s leading producers of sensors and sensor solutions for industrial applications. Founded in 1946 by Dr.-Ing. e. h. Erwin Sick, the company with headquarters in Waldkirch im Breisgau near Freiburg ranks among the technological market leaders. With more than 50 subsidiaries and equity investments as well as numerous agencies, SICK maintains a presence around the globe. In the fiscal year 2017, SICK had almost 9,000 employees worldwide and a group revenue of around EUR 1.5 billion.
Additional information about SICK is available on the Internet at http://www.sick.com or by phone on +49 (0) 7681 202 4183.