WHEN HUMAN SKILLS ARE IN SHORT SUPPLY, ROBOTS CAN STEP IN

Manufacturers from across Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and the Southwest came together at Business & Innovation Magazine’s first Manufacturing LIVE in-person event for more than two years.

The first Business & Innovation Magazine Manufacturing LIVE of 2022 was hosted by Gloucester-based Prima Dental, now the world leader in the design and manufacture of dental burs (and you can read about the company in our interview with managing director Alun Jones on pages 74-76).

A dental bur is a tiny drill piece made from carbide inserted into a dentist’s drill, enabling them to cut teeth, and a major key to Prima Dental’s recent growth has been its long-standing investment in robotics and automation.

Keynote speaker at the event was Professor Farid Dailami, Associate

Professor at the renowned Bristol Robotics Laboratory, and perhaps surprisingly for a man who has immersed himself in the technology for more than 20 years, one of his first points was that robotics and automation isn’t always going to be the answer for manufacturers.

Is the work dangerous, dirty or dull? Call in the robots

He asked: “Why would a manufacturer want to use robots? Generally, if the work is dangerous, dirty or dull, or they want better productivity or consistency.

“And that’s great, but it’s not always the answer. When I visited a company which made automotive components and saw an employee who was sitting stamping parts I thought – surely that person is bored to tears, that process could be automated?

“But not in this case. The person in question had learning difficulties. Sometimes the solution might be automation, but in that situation it would have had negative consequences – an employee losing a job which made them feel valued.”

“If you are putting automation in, what are you going to do with the displaced labour? At Bristol Robotics Laboratory, we encourage our developers to take that into consideration.”

Professor Dailami illustrated his point with another case study, Numatic in Somerset which makes the famous Henry Hoover. “Numatic approached Bristol Robotics Laboratory to help it develop some levels of robotic automation, but they valued their staff and told us that they were not prepared to make anyone redundant.

“That made it easier for them to introduce automation to one key process which stopped staff suffering from repetitive strain injury. We secured funding through a government knowledge transfer partnership for a whole assembly section, and it has been successfully implemented on the shop floor.”

As a result, Numatic has improved its productivity 50 per cent, with staff deployed in other areas.

There is no such thing as an intelligent robot

The idea that robots will replace humans in the next decades is way off the mark, said Professor Dailami.

“Human beings are excellent in terms of our sensing capabilities. We are good at collaborating. Robots are not. Humans are also very good actuators and the way that we combine of all this is phenomenal. It’s a huge, huge challenge for robotics engineers to get anywhere near a human being’s capabilities.

“Cognition in robotics is key and Bristol Robotics Laboratory is driving this forward.”

Despite these challenges, there now seems to be a greater than ever commitment among manufacturers that they need to look at robotics for a number of reasons, not least of which are to boost productivity, and to address a severe lack of skilled labour.

The skills challenge was highlighted by

Chris Mould, Partner at accountants Crowe, who also spoke at the event.

He said: “In our annual manufacturing report, published in February this year, we found that 82 per cent of those we surveyed had trouble recruiting skilled employees. And more worrying still, around 40 per cent of them said that the people with the skills they need don’t exist at all.”

What’s stopping manufacturers adopting robotic technology faster is often the financial investment needed.

The Valley of Death

“Bringing an idea to life costs money,” said Professor Dailami.

“We call it the Valley of Death: the period in the development of a product when a significant increase in investment is required, making the risk of failure much more likely to outweigh any potential future return.”

There are sources of government funding which can be applied for, from knowledge transfer partnerships (KTPs) to Innovate UK grants, but they can be difficult to secure, he added.

Another challenge for those working on robotics research and development is the UK’s departure from the European Union.

“Many of the research and development programmes were funded through the EU, and they are now no longer available to us, probably until such time as the Northern Ireland issue is resolved,” he added.

“Europe is a world leader in robotics. Both Europe and the UK are doing exceptionally well in that domain. And to be separated from that could have a negative effect.”

Despite the challenges it faces, Bristol Robotics Laboratory remains the most comprehensive academic centre for multi -disciplinary robotics research in the UK. A collaborative partnership between the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol) and the University of Bristol, it is home to a community of more than 450 academics, researchers and industry practitioners who will collaborate with small and large companies to develop robotics and automation for their business.

And it’s particularly the smaller companies, which don’t have the financial luxury of in-house research and development teams, which it has been tasked to help by government.

“Small and medium sized enterprises are the UK’s largest wealth generators and biggest employers in the Southwest,” said Professor Dailami.

“We are here to help companies from any sector explore the benefits of robotic technologies and to identify the most appropriate robotic equipment for their organisation.”