HERMES - Hyper-flexible bimanual robot manipulation and packing of deformable parts in footwear industry

The footwear industry accounts for some of the shortest production runs to be found (eight pairs of shoes is the average order size). Automization is more and more required in order to ensure competiveness in this growing market. The introduction of intelligent robotic technologies can contribute to overcome the complexity in the automation of the associated production processes.The HERMES experiment will demonstrate the potential to apply robotic technologies in the packaging process of the high added value shoe production. Important key technologies for bimanual manipulation, specifically in terms of detection and manipulation of non-‐rigid parts, will be developed and transferred to potential system integrators for future commercialization.