Design World – August 2019

88 August 2019 http://www.designworldonline.com DESIGN WORLD

The Robot Report

“Personalization is important for what an

individual wears, such as harnesses and

footwear.”

“We’re looking very closely at what’s

needed for males and females of varying

heights,” Beaufait said. “We’ve already

shown that an average-size male

wearing the robot can fit through a

normal 36-in. door.”

Managing expectations by use case

“There are specific user-customizable

items for people in different tasks, and

we provide a high level of adaptability

in software and controls,” said Beaufait.

“We’ll be looking in alpha testing at what

customers want for different uses, such

as center of gravity or different modes.”

“We want to put configurability into

the robot but not give too many choices.

It might be customer by customer or

industry by industry,” he added. “We

really want to understand what the use

cases will be.”

“Once they understand the Guardian’s

adaptability with a human inside, we’ll

see how they get comfortable in the

environment and what are the best end

effectors by use,” Beaufait said.

Looking for talent

“We’re definitely looking for people,” said

Beaufait. “At Sarcos.com/careers, we have

about 20 jobs listed, and we’re adding

one to three per week to our team.”

“As we evolve from the

development stage to production and

commercialization, we’re looking for

engineers with electromechanical,

control, and software experience, as

well as those who have worked in a field

that have experience with industry and

product,” he said.

Competition and ROI

“When you look at what’s out there

today, there’s basically passive

exoskeletons that extend endurance,

then medical rehabilitation, and then a

few looking at industrial exoskeletons to

augment human performance,” Beuafait

said. “Based on what we’ve heard from

two academic institutions -- including

Virginia Tech, which has an NSF grant --

and the X-TAG members, there’s nobody

doing what we’ve been doing since

2000.”

“A few companies, particularly in Asia,

are working on industrial exoskeletons,

but they appear to be where we were

10 years ago,” he said. “Once we put our

product out there, we have to continue to

invest and stay ahead.”

“There’s nobody doing a full-bodied

exoskeleton that people can use for an

eight-hour shift and can lift 200 lb.,” he

said. “That said, our real challenge isn’t

competition, but showing customers

Sarcos expects to customize

exoskeletons and tools by

use case.

| Sarcos

the return on investment and how our

exoskeleton can reduce injuries and help

one worker do the work of four people.”

“I believe that we’re at an inflection

point, as we look at the unstructured

robotics space,” Beaufait said. “I expect

we’ll see a lot of technology to improve

power usage and applicability. It’s a very

exciting time for robotics in general.”

Sarcos’ industrial exoskeleton will be

available for pre-orders later this year

under a robots-as-a-service (RaaS)

model and will ship to the first customers

in early 2020. RR

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