Inropa leverages Microsoft ToF Technology and AI for on-the-fly Programming of Painting robots

Inropa announced that they have joined the Microsoft Azure Depth Platform program. The collaboration will help Inropa to continue and evolve their intelligent robot painting solution with Microsoft Time of Flight (ToF) technology platform and Azure services. The solution is expected to save customers up to 30% of their paint consumption and will enhance worker safety and minimize environmental impact.

The manufacturing industry has a long history of developing automated techniques for applying paint and other surface treatments to the products they create. The industry is also highly competitive and any robotics in which manufacturers invest must be flexible, cost-effective, and adaptable to object variations and can also stand up to working in a variety of industrial environments.

Inropa, a portmanteau derived from intelligent + robot + painting, is based in Denmark and has been in business since 2002. The company specializes in automatic, semi-automatic, and manual off-line programming systems for paint and surface treatment robots in several different industries worldwide.

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Our customers include well-recognized names worldwide such as LEGO, Daimler, and Detroit Diesel, and with solutions executing 30,000 robot programs every day. Inropa provides software for paint and surface treatment that increases production capacity, decreases, or completely removes manual robot programming, ensures a high surface quality, and reduces costs for paint material and personnel.

Because it can measure and define products on the fly and paint them without any human interaction or reprogramming, Inropa’s solution gives manufacturers a means to more effectively manage the paint portion of their production lines to allow for a greater range of shapes and sizes and coating applications.

The collaboration with Microsoft allows Inropa to develop solutions for their paint robotics customers that surpasses anything available on the market today. Using Microsoft’s depth vision to identify and classify objects in a variety of environments and accurately apply a coating in one pass on the production line is a big step forward. Today the paint process can require multiple stations to ensure coverage and are optimal for batches of the same object shape and surface application.

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Henrik Andersen, Inropa CEO notes that, “variations in product type, sizes and configurations require fully automatic programming to make robots profitable. The Microsoft 3D ToF technology which is recognized for its superior resolution, accuracy and wide field of view (FOV), as compared with existing commercially available technologies is critical to enable us to deliver such capabilities for complex products.” The collaboration with Microsoft will also include Inropa’s AI running on Azure, opening new opportunities for Inropa and their customers.

Inropa serves customers in many of manufacturing sectors including windows and doors, structural steel beams and windmill industry. Their solution provides customers the adaptability necessary for their painting and coating processes. Henrik Andersen adds that, “we expect our customers to s********* 30% of their paint consumption” and that “ensuring cost-effective solutions for rapidly changing products and configurations is our business. Ensuring worker safety and minimizing environmental impact is our responsibility and providing a high production capacity in the paint lines is our DNA.”

Daniel Bar, Azure Depth Platform lead notes, “Robotic solutions evolved greatly over the years and incorporating 3D vision and AI capabilities to understand what is happening in their environment in real time and act accordingly is the next evolution. Using Microsoft technology enables Inropa to differentiate themselves in the market and give customers greater production line flexibility.”

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