Universal Robots

Universal Robots was founded in 2005 by the engineers Esben Østergaard, Kasper Støy, and Kristian Kassow.[2][3] During joint research at the Syddansk Universitet Odense, they came to the conclusion that the robotics market was dominated by heavy, expensive, and unwieldy robots. As a consequence they developed the idea to make robot technology accessible to small and medium-sized businesses.[4] In 2008 the first UR5 cobots were available on the Danish and German market. In 2012 the second cobot, UR10, was launched.[5] At Automatica 2014 in Munich the Company launched a totally revised version of its cobots.[6] One year later, in spring 2015 the table-top cobot UR3 was launched.[7] At Automatica 2018 in Munich a brand new generation of Universal Robots' cobots called e-Series was launched raising the standard for collaborative robots. In September 2019, the company launched UR16e suited for high-payload tasks, like heavy material handling, heavy machine tending, packaging & palletising, and autonomous mobile robots (AMRs).

UR was purchased by Teradyne for US$285 million in 2015.[8][9]

The products consist of the heavy-duty UR16e, the table-top UR3 and UR3e,[10] the UR5 and UR5e,[11], and the UR10 and UR10e.[12]

All cobots are six-jointed robot arms with a very low weight including cable of respectively 11 kilos, 20 kilos, 33 kilos, and 33 kilos. The UR3 and UR3e have a lifting ability of 3 kilos and a working radius of 500mm (19.7 in), the UR5 and UR5e have a lifting ability of 5 kilos and a working radius of 850mm (33.5 in), the UR10 and UR10e a lifting ability of 10 kilos and a working radius of 1300mm (51.2 in), and the UR16e a lifting ability of 16 kilos and a working radius of 900mm (35.4 in). The e-Series has a pose repeatability between ± 0.03mm and 0.05mm.

Universal Robots collaborative robots (cobots) can work right alongside personnel with no safety guarding, based on the results of a mandatory risk assessment.[13]

The safety settings of the latest generation of Universal Robots’ lightweight cobots can be adjusted for each specific solution.[14] The robot arm can run in two operating modes of the safety functions; a normal and a reduced one. A switch between safety settings during the cobot’s operation is also possible. All these safety functions are safety rated PL d (EN ISO 13849:2008 ) and certified by TÜV NORD.[15]

UR's cobots are used within both small to medium-sized businesses and large corporations [16] within industries such as automotive, electronics, metal & machining, pharmaceuticals, and manufacturing.

In 2016, the company launched its online ecosystem Universal Robots+, and in early 2017 it launched a new online digital learning platform called Universal Robots Academy. Through this platform, users go through nine learning modules, learning how to program the UR collaborative robots.

In 2018, a brand new generation of Universal Robots' cobots called e-Series was launched raising the standard for collaborative robots. The 'e' in e-Series stands for empowering, ease of use, everyone and evolution.[17] The e-Series consist of four cobots: the UR3e, UR5e, UR10e, and finally the UR16e which was launched in 2019. In comparison to the previous generation, the CB Series, they have a higher accuracy for both position repeatability (± 0.03, ± 0.03 and ± 0.05 mm) and force (± 3.5, ± 4.0 and ± 5.5 N) and torque (± 0.10, ± 0.30 and ± 0.60 Nm), since they have a built-in Force/Torque sensor.[18] With the e-Series, they also added a few more safety features, re-designed the teach pendant to be more intuitive and simplified the programming flow with more wizards.

• Official website