Robotic Kit Assembly & Packing

A leading international company that provides Retail Marketing Services chose to partner with RA to boost the speed, productivity and safety with which they can produce and roll-out kits of time-sensitive promotional campaign materials to their retail FMCG clients.

CHALLENGE : In a particularly hands-on area of their production, staff are required to assemble and pack kits of promotional flyers and posters to appear in hundreds of retail stores, ready to match their clients’ competitive and rapidly-updated discount-cycles.

Each of these kits could contain 20 or so different adverts in different sizes and quantities for each store’s window and Point-of-Sale (POS) displays. Staff would need to pick and collect these individually in an extremely repetitive and mundane process while somehow sustaining the close attention needed to ensure each kit has the exact contents for a successful in-store promotion. The risks of repetitive-strain injuries, paper-cuts, hard-to-handle thin gloss papers and inattention combined to regularly cause production stoppages, incomplete kits and damaged materials through mishandling.

SOLUTION : Working closely with the company, RA designed a compact automation robot cell built around the high-speed MPP3 picking robot from Motoman Yaskawa, capable of 2.5 cycles every second. The cell features many bays and adjustable dividers to contain all the promo materials in their changing sizes, as well as safety fencing and interlocks to ensure safety when operating. The 3kg payload industrial robotic arm is fitted with a pneumatically-driven vacuum cup assembly designed by RA, and the robot is powered and programmed via the compact FS100 Controller with its easy-to-use, Windows-based teaching pendant.

Speed and productivity have been substantially increased while staff are now able to be re-deployed in safer and more-engaging work.

BENEFITS :

  • Reduced labor costs
  • Reduced staff injuries from repetitive strain
  • Reduced compensation claims
  • Reduced losses in production time
  • Reduced staff turnover & management
  • Increased productivity
  • Increased product quality
  • Increased product consistency
  • Increased competitive advantage
  • Increased safety