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Remote robot troubleshooting firm raises $4.1m
A Canadian company, Olis Robotics, has raised $4.1m to fund further development of its technology for remote monitoring, control and troubleshooting of industrial robots. The Seattle-based company says that its Olis Connect system tackles costly robot downtime, significantly improving OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) of industrial robots.
“Robot downtime can cost a large plant over $1m per hour,” says Olis CEO, Fredrik Ryden. “When every minute counts, you need to leverage remote tools to react as quickly as possible no matter where you are. Our technology is ingeniously simple to use and intensely practical in terms of its impact.”
Olis Connect is controlled via a Web browser and delivered on an edge-hosted PC that can be connected rapidly to both new and legacy industrial robots and robotic cells. It works across robot brands, and currently supports robots from Fanuc and Universal Robots – thus addressing about 20% of the global stock of more than 3.5 million operating industrial robots.
With its new funding, Olis plans to extend support to other robot brands, representing more than half of all industrial robots. The funding will also help it to expand its partnerships with systems integrators and to develop new products.
Once Olis’ plug-and-play device has been installed and secure remote access configured, users can monitor and manage equipment remotely from anywhere in the world via any browser. If a problem occurs with a robot, Olis Connect sends an alert via a secure connection to the user’s device, without connecting to the cloud, thus reducing the risk of cybersecurity issues. Users can then use the system to perform remote error recovery actions such as releasing a robot’s grip on a part, or moving it from an error position.
The software provides a remote error correction function, allowing users to get robots back up and running remotely, thus reducing downtime from hours to minutes. Three cameras provide low-latency monitoring of the robot cell, enabling 24/7 measurement of key performance indicators such as OEE and instant, on-demand video replay to diagnose the cause of any errors.
Olis Connect does not violate a robot’s existing safety permissions and restrictions. This means that velocity, acceleration, and joint limit settings on the robot are always obeyed when remote controlling the arm.
“Being able to remotely operate industrial robots is a game-changer for us and the industry as a whole,” says Brad Sparkman, president and CEO of Innovative Finishing Solutions, a Canadian integrator of Fanuc automotive painting robots. “We have deployed thousands of robots in the past two decades. Given the current labour challenges, we expect a majority of those to be retrofitted with Olis technology within the next couple of years.”
Olis Robotics is a spinoff from the University of Washington. Its telerobotic technology is the result of R&D with the US Navy and Nasa. The company has optimised the technology for industrial automation applications.
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