IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2017 - 8

INDUSTRIAL ACTIVITIES

2017 IEEE/IFR Award
for IERA
By Erwin Prassler and Arturo Baroncelli

ince its debut at the IEEE Inforce and six-axis force/torque sensors ANYdrive: A Modular Joint
ternational Conference on Rofor industrial robotic applications
Actuator for Interacting Robots
botics and Automation (ICRA) ● Steve Cousins, Savioke: relay autono- ANYdrive is a highly integrated series2005 in Barcelona, the IEEE/
mous delivery robot.
elastic actuator unit (Figure 2). This
International Federation of Robotics
The finalist had the opportunity to modular joint integrates a brushless
(IFR) Award for Invention and Entre- pitch his or her business idea at ICRA motor and harmonic drive gear in series
preneurship in Robotics and Auto- 2017 in Singapore to the jury and to the with a spring, along with position senmation (IERA) has become one of the large audience of ICRA participants. sors and control electronics. All commost renowned nonscientific
ponents are arranged around a
awards in the robotics comhollow shaft and built into a community and attracted more and
pact IP67 aluminum housing.
more applications every year. Its
ANYdrive's innovative design
uniqueness is also due to the fact
allows for highly dynamic movethat it is a joint award given by
ments and collision maneuvers
the robotics industry, represented
without damage from impulsive
by IFR, and the robotics research
contact forces, and, at the same
community, represented by the
time, it enables highly sensitive
IEEE Robotics and Automation
interaction with the environSociety (RAS). The award is a vital
ment. This is of special interest
demonstration that the robotics
for robots that should interact
industry and research do work
with humans or their environtogether very successfully.
ment, such as collaborative and
Figure 1. The 2017 IEEE/IFR IERA Award winner, Steve
The competition for the 2017 Cousins, Savioke: relay autonomous delivery robot.
mobile robots. With ANYdrives
IERA Award was remarkable in
as building blocks, any multiterms of the number of applicajoint robotic structure, such as a
tions as well as their quality. A jury The winner by unanimous decision was robot with arms, legged robots, exoskelcomposed of three members of the RAS Steve Cousins (Figure 1).
etons, and rehabilitation devices, can
and three member of IFR finally
All finalists were given the oppor- quickly be built without additional bearselected four finalists:
tunity to describe their business idea ings, encoders, or joint electronics.
● Marco Hutter, ANYbotics AG: ANYin upcoming editions of IEEE Robotics
In ANYdrive, the joint output podrive, a modular joint actuator for and Automation Magazine. The fol- sition and the spring deflection are
advanced interacting robots
lowing are short introductions from measured using absolute position
● Jody Saglia, Movendo Technology
the second-, third-, and fourth-place sensors providing a position accuracy
s.r.l.: Hunova, an easy-to-use and finalists. The 2018 edition of the IEEE/ of 0.025° and a torque resolution of
intuitive medical device
IFR IERA Award, which has been 0.08 Nm. Thanks to integrated custom
● György Cserey, OptoForce Ltd.: sensrenamed the IEEE/IFR Award for motor control electronics, the joint
ing flexibility, three-dimensional (3-D) Innovation and Entrepreneurship in torque, position, and impedance can be
Robotics and Automation, will be orga- directly regulated without any addinized by IFR during Automatica and tional components. The corresponding
the International Symposium on command values are sent over the conDigital Object Identifier 10.1109/MRA.2017.2722203
Date of publication: 13 September 2017
Robotics 2018.
troller area network bus or Ethernet for

IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

SEPTEMBER 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2017