The MANiBOT consortium met for its Fourth Plenary Meeting in Burgos, Spain, marking another important milestone in the project’s journey to develop bi-manual mobile robots with advanced, human-like manipulation skills. The project is progressing smoothly, with partners reporting steady advances across work packages.

The meeting was hosted by the University of Burgos, and gathered partners Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH/ITI), Central Institute for Labour Protection – National Research Institute (CIOP-PIB), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Technical University of Darmstadt, Technical University of Vienna, University of Bristol, Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies, ABB, Fraport, Masoutis, Schwarz Digital GmbH & Co. KG, and Tech Hive Labs.

Part of the meeting took place at the main testing site at the University, featuring a supermarket setup and a suitcase handling area, mirroring real-world environments where MANiBOT cobots will be deployed. The robots’ capabilities and movements were demonstrated for both use cases. The robot’s ability to move in its action space and reach suitcases was showcased. The team carefully checked the dimensions of elements to be used for the demonstrations, ensuring optimal conditions for the cobot’s testing.

Significant steps in the development of the robotic arm were highlighted during the discussions. A demonstration was made on integrating code repositories from GitLab directly to the robots, streamlining the deployment of new features and updates and demonstrating how code can be sent to the cloud and deployed to the robots. 

As well as physical test sites, the meeting also examined the creation of 3D simulation environments and the 3D assets library, as well as physical data collection of handling scenarios. Among other topics related to the safety, trustworthiness and dependability of the MANiBOT solution, the Framework for Developing a Human-Robot Interaction Assessment was presented.

Some integrations are scheduled to be ready early, in the autumn, accelerating the timeline for advanced demonstrations. The next phase will see further integration and pilot activities, setting the stage for MANiBOT to make a tangible impact in real-world applications.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme under Grant Agreement No 101120823.