Velodyne Lidar, MOV.AI team up on AMR navigation tools

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MOV.ai and Velodyne partner to deliver out-of-the-box navigation solutions for AMR developers. | Image credit: MOV.ai

Velodyne Lidar and MOV.AI are teaming up to provide robot manufacturers with enterprise-grade automation solutions, including mapping, navigation, obstacle avoidance and risk avoidance. The MOV.AI Robotics Engine Platform, combined with Velodyne’s lidar sensors, addresses the growing demand for automation in dynamic collaborative environments such as e-commerce, logistics, manufacturing and hospitals.

The MOV.AI Robotics Engine Platform, powered by Velodyne’s Puck lidar sensors, delivers advanced tools that allow autonomous mobile robots (AMR) manufacturers and integrators to address the challenges of safely moving in changing and unstructured environments like material handling and warehouse logistics. These markets are being driven by the dramatic growth of e-commerce. For instance, the pandemic helped propel U.S. online sales to $791 billion in 2020, up 32 percent from the prior year, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The Robotics Engine Platform helps AMR manufacturers quickly develop and deploy robots that can operate in dynamic environments in which humans, manual machines and robots work side by side. The platform leverages the performance and reliability of the Puck sensor to allow mobile robots to traverse outside controlled situations and safely function in unfamiliar and unpredictable settings. The Puck’s compact form factor enables it to be embedded easily into robots. The sensor delivers high accuracy in complex indoor and outdoor environments.

The MOV.AI ROS-based Robotics Engine Platform provides AMR manufacturers and automation integrators with the enterprise-grade tools they need for advanced automation. It includes a visual Integrated Development Environment (IDE), off the shelf algorithms and integrations, fleet management, flexible interfaces with warehouse environments such as ERP and WMS, and cyber-security compliance. The solution provides ±2 cm accuracy for a 65 percent dynamic environment.

“Adding MOV.AI and Velodyne technologies to TUGBOT.ai provided our robot with an off-the-shelf, high-accuracy navigation and localization solution for the high and dynamic environments where we are deploying our AMRs,” said Fernando Freitas, CEO at RoboSavvy, manufacturer of the AMR TUGBOT.ai. “Using lidar-based SLAM enables TUGBOT.ai to navigate safely among people and other vehicles with accurate and consistent performance.”

“MOV.AI’s mission is to simplify collaborative robot development and to provide AMR manufacturers and integrators with everything they need to develop and operate great robots,” said Motti Kushnir, MOV.AI’s CEO. “Through the collaboration with Velodyne, we are able to offer our customers advanced SLAM navigation powered by the Puck, one of the world’sleading lidar sensors. Use of our Robotics Engine Platform allows AMR manufacturers to quickly implement state-of-the-art navigation, while leaving them the ability to customize it to their needs.”

“We are very excited about the collaboration with MOV.AI and integration of our lidar sensors into the Robotics Engine Platform, including future expansion to our solid state Velarray and Velabit products,” said Erich Smidt, Executive Director of Europe, Velodyne Lidar. “There is a growing demand for automation and integration of our sensors into collaborative robots. We see extensive potential in this space. Partnering with MOV.AI can enable us to bring safety, efficiency and sustainability into the industrial sector on a large, global scale.”