Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Production Systems

Together with our partners SEW Eurodrive, SCHUNK, VisionTools, and the HKA institutes IDDS and IRAS, we are researching a standardized software platform for manufacturing companies that will enable federated learning for robotic manipulation across company boundaries. Robotic grasping and assembly are the main focus of research at the IRP.

Many thanks to the Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung for funding the FEATHER (Federated Embodied AI Technology Harmonizing Efficient Robotics) project as part of the CZS Transfer program.

Three weeks ago we had a fruitful kick off from our new Project "Nachhaltige und wirtschaftliche Elektrogeräte Reparatur durch robotergestützte Automatisierung" (NewEra) at the  Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space in Berlin.

It was an interesting start, especially to connect with the various project teams in the field of Digital Green Tech. We are delighted to be partnering with the Institute of Materials and Processes (HKA), Eichler GmbH, and EVT Eye Vision Technology GmbH to develop intelligent technologies for robot-based repairs. More information can be found here.

The paper "QBIT: Quality-Aware Cloud-Based Benchmarking for Robotic Insertion Tasks" was presented by Constantin Schempp at the 2025 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in Hangzhou, China. This work was developed as part of the PIPE project

Yesterday, BadenTV visited the Institute of Robotics and Intelligent Production Systems (IRP). It was a good opportunity to present some of our current research topics!

You can find the report here.

The paper "Highly dynamic physical interaction for robotics: design and control of an active remote center of compliance" was presented by Patrick Frank at the 2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics & Automation (ICRA) in Atlanta, USA. This work was developed as part of the ISASDeMoRo project.

On 22.01.2025 the AI theme day took place at the HKA. In his presentation "From data to actions - How do robots learn physical interaction?", Christian Friedrich presented current research topics from the IRP that show how robotic manipulation skills can be learned.

The sensor-actuator system (SAS) developed in ISASDeMoRo was exhibited at HKA's ResearchContacts24 on November 7, 2024. This trade fair facilitates networking and information exchange among research institutes, companies, and other interested parties. The focus of the demos was on industrial use cases, such as mounting a component on a top-hat rail.

The paper "Robot Agnostic Visual Servoing" was presented by Constantin Schempp at the 30th IEEE International Conference on Mechatronics and Machine Vision in Practice (M2VIP) in Leeds, England. This work was developed as part of the ALPAKA project.

The paper "PIPE: Process Informed Parameter Estimation, a learning based approach to task generalized system identification" was presented by Constantin Schempp at the 2024 IEEE 20th International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE) in Bari, Italy. This work is part of the ALPAKA project.

The ISASDeMoRo project team was represented at the Baden-Württemberg Foundation's Research Day 2024 on June 25, 2024. There, interested visitors were able to learn about the advantages of the developed sensor-actuator system (SAS) and the major goal of autonomous assembly and disassembly by robot systems. Various demos were prepared for this purpose, allowing a direct comparison of classic force control and force control using the SAS.

The first networking meeting "CZS Forschungsstart" took place in Mannheim and Ludwigshafen from 06.06. to 07.06.2024.
In addition to the presentation of individual research projects and workshops, the program offered a great opportunity to get to know each other and network.