Accerion is in one of the world’s fastest-growing, fastest-evolving tech sectors as more and more companies use autonomous robotics to automate. To play in this arena, we’re quickly anticipating customer needs by adding greater functionality to our positioning products.
Triton is the newest product using our positioning technology, a more compact, more affordable option for mapping warehouse floors. It’s versatile enough to displace other positioning technologies or integrate into – and enhance – clients’ existing robotic products.
Simply put, Triton can execute where other technologies can’t.
For example, some clients have long, narrow aisles, some as long as 100 meters.
“It’s very, very hard to navigate in that aisle with anything but our technology,” says Accerion System Engineer Ruben Vandenheede. “We have the only navigation technology that can handle that.”
“Think of it this way,” says Accerion’s Software Engineer Anurag Kulkarni. “Each section of that long warehouse aisle looks exactly alike. If you try to tell a computer to look visually at the environment, the only thing it sees is repeating objects like the shelves. If I’m here or 10 meters farther or 10 meters farther, it all looks the same and the computer cannot distinguish.”
But Triton scans the floor itself and stores the data that allows minute maneuvering even in long, narrow warehouse aisles.
If those aisles store racks, pallets and trolleys that are low to the ground, Triton has no problem with that. In fact, our client Eurotec manufactures the lowest AGV on the market, the Lowpad.
Lowpads fit under equipment such as a rolling rack. It slides under and lifts the rack. Triton then feeds the positioning data to Lowpad’s navigation stack to tell it where to go. This maneuver is done without infrastructure for fast and accurate deployment in those narrow aisles.
This required us to design the Triton to be small and compact. In fact, we actually designed the height specifically so it would fit the height of the Lowpad.
“At first, it was very hard to design it with such a small form factor. But it had to be four centimeters (tall),” Ruben said. “We went from the original Jupiter to a design 10 times smaller as well as more affordable.”
Because of its size, Triton is the only product that fits Lowpad and still provides the mm-level accuracy necessary for industrial automators. That makes Triton and Lowpad a match made in heaven.
“Triton is the product of a brilliant team of engineers. Within record time they managed to develop this incredible product,” said Accerion’s Founder and Managing Director Willem-Jan Lamers. “Ruben and Anurag dedicated their efforts full-time to the project – on the hardware and software developments respectively.
“The end-result is a beautifully designed piece of equipment!”
That team leveraged in-house knowledge while working with EPR and NTS OPTEL on the optics and with FRAMOS, a German firm that produces advanced vision components, including optics and sensors.
“Those collaborations dramatically accelerated the design process and prototyping, reducing the time it took to get Triton to market,” said Vincent.
Triton is being pilot-tested by several clients now, and Accerion is taking orders with delivery in early 2020. If you’re interested in learning more about Triton, contact us at sales@accerion.tech.