Multi-year agreement will deliver mobile robots with greater productivity, improved spatial awareness and lower cost of ownership
Tuesday March 19th, 2024 – Opteran Technologies, the Natural Intelligence company, is today announcing at LogiMAT 2024 a major partnership with SAFELOG, the leading global order picking and transportation robot manufacturer. SAFELOG will integrate Opteran Mind, the company’s general purpose autonomy product, with its mobile robots which operate in a range of warehouse and factory settings. This multi-year agreement will enable SAFELOG to address the urgent need for greater productivity from autonomous robots operating in hazardous, dusty environments with dynamic lighting, ever changing obstacles and without GPS.
Safelog aims to offer best-in-class mobile robots for order picking and transportation, and together with Opteran, it is developing a new generation of mobile robots that harmonize robustness and efficiency. A key objective is to reduce the failure rate of mobile robots due localization errors in existing 2D and 3D LIDAR, and vSLAM solutions which affects productivity. This is exacerbated when hundreds of robots operate together in a warehouse setting because each installation requires an infrastructure consisting of magnetic tracks and QR codes or reflectors, increasing commissioning time and operating costs. Opteran’s localization software enables new projects to be activated quickly and efficiently without additional infrastructure.
“There are a lot of challenges for existing autonomy solutions to overcome in the complex conditions of a warehouse, so we have been amazed by what Opteran Mind can achieve,” said Michael Reicheicher, Managing Director, SAFELOG. “Opteran’s technology performs significantly better in our mobile robots, which will be hugely beneficial for our customers. Natural Intelligence, their approach to AI, offers a robust technology that we are confident will differentiate our AMRs in the global market.”
Opteran Mind is based on 10 years of research into insect brains, where the team reverse engineered natural brain algorithms. Fundamentally, nature does navigation more efficiently and by replicating its approach in a model Opteran calls Natural Intelligence, the company has delivered a dramatic breakthrough. It estimates its solution could cost less than $160 USD running on standard ARM Cores using low cost Sony IMX219 cameras. This contrasts to current state-of-the-art solutions which can range in cost from $8,400 USD for a 2D LiDAR setup to $27,000 USD for a 3D LiDAR set-up.
“We are delighted to announce our partnership with SAFELOG, as this is another significant milestone on our path to commercializing Opteran Mind,” said David Rajan, CEO and co-founder, Opteran Technologies. “We are seeing a rapid take up of our technology across the US, Japan and Europe so today’s agreement with SAFELOG underlines why our technology is best in class for localization and mapping for mobile robots. It also shows that while Natural Intelligence is unique in the market our inputs and outputs are standard making Opteran Mind a simple and attractive solution to integrate with existing mobile robots.
Opteran and SAFELOG will be showcasing their collaboration on the SAFELOG Stand (Hall 5, Stand: c29) at LogiMAT 2024 March 19 – 21, the international trade show for intralogistics solutions and process management. Opteran Mind will be shown with a SAFELOG mobile robot to illustrate how it can deliver increased adaptability and minimize downtime. It can be embedded in ground-based and aerial robots in a wide variety of applications from logistics and warehouse distribution, oil and gas inspection drones, mining UAVs and autonomous vehicles.