reporter ｜Zhou Qi
edited ｜Jiang Yuyan
A AI canteen in Changning District, Shanghai is popular.
"Machine Chef" can automatically complete cooking - put clean vegetables into the corresponding intelligent cooking system, the system will automatically identify the ingredients according to the menu of the day, fry, roast, steam and cook, and recharge the juice to warm up.
self-service meal pickup area contains JAKA MiniCobo commercial collaborative robot, which is paired with a robot that automatically recognizes the dishes on the cargo lane and can also make up meals in real time. After consumers select dishes from the "smart slalom platform", they identify the smart settlement platform to settle through AI. The card-sharing robot behind
has just completed a D round of financing of about 1 billion yuan, setting a record for the largest single amount in the field of collaborative robots. The participating institutions include Temasek, SoftBank Group, etc.
In 2021, sales of card cards exceeded 6,000 units. In the first half of this year, sales increased by more than 200% year-on-year. It is estimated that sales are expected to exceed 10,000 units this year.
"We will also set up a factory in Nagoya, Japan." Li Mingyang, founder of the Jieka Robot, said in an interview with a reporter from "21CBR".
Intelligent packaging to robot
Before founding the festival card, Li Mingyang held important technical and management positions in well-known dairy beverage and equipment companies such as Coca-Cola and Tetra Pak Packaging.
years of experience in the food industry, he found that the dairy packaging process, especially the Spring Festival and other holiday gift box packaging, is still mainly manpower; on the other hand, there are fewer and fewer young people willing to engage in repetitive and basic intensive labor, and the impact on enterprise production efficiency has been further expanded.
How to use automation technology to achieve intelligent production in the packaging process, achieving the dual purpose of solving labor shortage and reducing labor costs?
By chance, Li Mingyang met a group of like-minded engineers and scholars.
In 2014, the card-sharing robot was established to create a gift box milk intelligent packaging system for the dairy industry, filling the industry gap. In 2017, the company's independently developed series of collaboration robots for the Xiaojiao series of collaborative robots was launched.
Li Mingyang said, "The team has always insisted on being a robot that everyone can use freely. While liberating their hands, let the operators of the original production line become technical personnel who control the robots."
For eight years, Li Mingyang led the team to focus on the research and development and upgrading of collaborative robot products, and in-depth research on application scenarios and mining customer needs.
card robot has launched 21 products in six major series, including JAKA Zu series collaborative robots, All-in-one integration series collaborative robots, to meet the application needs of different scenarios.
In the past, customers had to spend a lot of time on programming teaching and use; now, through wireless teaching and other technologies, customers can use tablets, mobile phones and other mobile terminals to remotely control and homework editing to get rid of the traditional bulky teaching instruments and lengthy control lines.
"The whole process supports pure Chinese teaching. Workers only need half a day to train to reach the professional production level and work on their jobs." Li Mingyang told reporters.
has established 5 major R&D production bases and 2 key R&D centers around the world. It has 9 core technologies, 6 core algorithms, and more than 300 invention patents in the fields of robot body, motion control, servo drive, visual protection, force control protection, etc.
"The wireless teaching, graphical editing, and visual security protection technologies of the card are all first in the industry." Li Mingyang said that the card has established three "moats": strong operational capabilities, strong intelligence capabilities, and strong scenario capabilities.
Production operation growth rate improves
Traditional industrial robots are large in size and strong in strength, and there are safety hazards in operation in the same area of human-machine machines; they are not refined and flexible enough, and many industrial parts are extremely small and sophisticated, and still require manual operation.
Compared with traditional industrial robots, the card has the advantages of flexibility, intelligence, stability and durability, and simple programming.
Li Mingyang took the example of glasses manufacturing. In the field of traditional injection molding frame automation, the injection molding robot used is a three-axis robot, which can only achieve the discharge of injection molded parts, while the loading, water cutting, grinding and other processes need to be done manually.
glasses production field automation company Eco Robot introduced JAKA Zu 7 collaborative robot in 2022 to develop an automatic hinge inlay system. The collaborative robot of the
card is installed on the fixed mold headboard of the injection molding machine. The composite end clamp is installed at the end, with an accuracy of ±0.02mm. It can efficiently and independently complete the automatic inlay injection molding, removal and shearing water port movements in the hinge mold. The production process of
requires at least 3 people to complete according to the traditional operating method. After the card is added, it takes only one person to operate the system to achieve automated production.
injection molding machine barrel temperature reaches 80℃, and long-term high-temperature operations require high durability of the robot. Another highlight of
card is the use of a metal shell and a stuffy cover, which is resistant to high temperatures and is more durable, reaching the ultra-high protection level of IP68, and obtaining MTBF (average fault-free running time) 80,000 hours certification, reducing customer repair risks.
"This set a new industry record." Li Mingyang said.
EKO has purchased more than 100 JAKA Zu 7 collaborative robots for use in glasses production lines across the country. At the same time, Jieka and Eco have developed the back-end process of automated glasses production, including robot polishing, laser engraving, spraying, etc., to achieve mass production and application implementation.
card robots have been used in industrial processes such as handling, palletizing, testing, glue coating, polishing, polishing, welding, etc., and radiating nearly 50 sub-sectors in 11 major industries such as 3C electronics, automobiles and spare parts, semiconductors, precision manufacturing, electrical appliances, chemical fibers, and food.
How do bosses know which production link can use card-saving robots?
Li Mingyang is equipped with a plan and delivery team of more than 100 people. "This is similar to asking a designer during decoration. The solution team looks at which production links can be used. After that, a report will be provided to tell the boss what effect can be achieved with actual data."
Currently, the program has reached cooperation with more than 3,000 customers around the world.
Going overseas to join hands with Toyota
In March this year, the festival card robot participated in the 2022 24th iREX Japan Tokyo International Robot Exhibition.
"Japan has an aging population and a low fertility rate, and the labor scarcity problem is serious. In order to promote the popularization and application of robots, the Japanese government has given a series of preferential policies for enterprises to use robots." Chang Li, vice president of the company's marketing, said, "Therefore, Japan is a very important stop in the overseas plan of the holiday card."
As early as early February 2021, the Japanese Technology Center of the holiday card robot was established in Tokyo, and now the team exceeds 20 people.
In the automotive industry, collaborative robots are mostly used to install engine parts or various types of lamps, and are also suitable for fine processes that are difficult to deal with by some large industrial robots. Therefore, collaborative robots have been widely used in the automobile manufacturing industry.
card collaboration robot grasps two dimensions.
One is automotive parts products, such as chassis system, engine, transmission, transmission system, headlights, seats, etc.It has been used in the transmission system's bell-shaped shell machine production line, engine housing cleaning line, headlight assembly, car light guide strip detection, seat tightening installation, etc.;
The second is the process, such as stamping and handling, loading and unloading of machine tools, welding, tightening, assembly, glue coating, etc.
In an automobile parts manufacturing factory, the card robot is responsible for loading and unloading, locking screws, testing, assembly and other production line parts such as three-pin shaft grinding, inner star wheel grinding, and small-piece production processing.
"Originally, a machine tool production line was equipped with 20 workers, but now it has reduced 16-17 people. Taking the average salary in the Yangtze River Delta region as an example, enterprises can reduce labor costs by more than 1.2 million yuan a year, and the investment return cycle is less than 12 months." Li Mingyang introduced.
In April 2021, the card robot became the only global supplier in the field of Toyota's automotive collaborative robots and was used in various factories in the Toyota industrial chain. Chang Li told the 21CBR reporter that the card robot is also a collaborative robot supplier for automobile companies such as Honda, Volkswagen, and SAIC. All products of
are produced in Changzhou, Jiangsu. In order to meet the needs of Japanese customers for higher security and stability, Jika will open a factory in Nagoya.
"The Japanese market masters the core technology of robots, and the experience gained there will also feed back to Chinese factories, fundamentally improving the technical level, so that it will be easier to meet the needs of Chinese customers." Li Mingyang plans for the future.
