What do you think are the biggest blockers to the widespread adoption of robots in the UK?

great discussions Nicky Valentine 

IET Coventry are hosting a talk on a guide to implementing industrial robotics on 22- Apr at 1900. Info and registration links are below

#robotics

• IET Main Calendar Listing: https://events.theiet.org/events/industrial-robots-benefits-barriers-and-the-business-case-for-the-implementation/
• Event Registration Page: https://localevents.theiet.org/register.php?event=4b5a0e

Depends what you are thinking of with regards to robots. Obviously we have some sectors with extensive use of robotic industrial arms and similar automation (electronics, car manufacture etc), and think the UK does well on logistics automation.

I would say automation quantity is quite poor in the UK; and this is mostly centred around the supply chain. Bigger firms are often well equipt. Lots of small businesses that feed into larger ones, with people working away in metal sheds on cheap land hidden along the edges of many UK towns, are not so good and rely on manual work. The issue for them, in my experience, is capital.

Automation might have great benefits for them, but it's a risk if you need to borrow a lot at a high interest rate, often with the hope you can find the customers for this increased output ASAP once it is up and running. Typically they turn over very modest proifts, and that investment has to go on staff, facilities, meeting regulation etc. The biggest driver I have seen for SMEs to take the risk and adopt automation is typically a loss of access to semi-skilled staff as the existing workforces retires and new hires are hard to come by.

There are other issue (skills issues around long term running and mainteance, scale issues for UK based integrators, the cost of power etc.) that are also factors that could do with some work.

If you mean the fancier Tesla style human robots (which is what a lot of that strong academic base spends time on), they just aren't that practical in the real world. We should keep adaemic work going, but it would be churlish to put too much taxpayer investment in them too early, when so much of our industry could do with automation support or transport link improvements.

Hi Nicky,

Probably mostly that the UK decided to exit manufacturing as a major sector of its economy in the 1980s. I suspect (although I may of course be wrong) that the countries that are driving up that average in the article you linked to (assuming that it's correct of course!) are those which have heavily manufacturing based economies. As an economy based on finance and service industries there's going to be less demand in the UK. Of course that's a problem for robotics suppliers - i.e. the authors of that article - but not necessarily for anyone else!

Although there is a question as to whether the decision to exit manufacturing still makes sense given the capabilities of modern robotics. And the other question as to whether it made sense even at the time...

Thanks,

Andy

Economically (though maybe not socially) the close down and off-shoring  of factory work  made sense when north sea oil and gas could be exported in volume, and if we liked it or not that skewed our balance of trade, and made the pound desirable, making export harder as our labour and products  looked expensive to overseas buyers. It also softened any incentive to do anything more than let it happens so perhaps new methods like automation were not investigated & implemented as much as they might have been.
However, the gas and oil have both peaked, and now clearly visible after the fact, it was at some point in the late 1990s. So, like many other former fuel exporters, we are now net importers, at least for the cold parts of the year, and that makes us poorer, or rather, for at the moment at least, it does not as we can borrow, but it actually gives us a rising national debt instead.

I'm not sure how well we are realising this and making the necessary modifications. I suspect the govt. may just look surprised and expect some other clever chaps to do something - a policy that has worked for them for most of the 20th century.

Its not just energy of course, but it has been a big factor in the decline of the non 'city' side of UK business.

Mike.

For me it's about the money, the initial capital is too high for SMEs, the ROI seems too long-term for most businesses, and finding local, affordable system integrators is tough. It's a huge financial barrier.

Isn't there also a perception problem that confuses the distinction between special tooling and basic robot. 

Is a sensor/pushrod arrangement for rejecting defective/misaligned parts on a production line a robot. How many sensors, actuators, rotation and translation axes are needed? Is an automated back-hoe digger a robot?

I suspect that the UK hides the light under the bushel and won't count a significant piece of equipment as a robot until it's capable of looking good in a Hollywood epic or advert.

Good Point, there is the issue of perception. Also what about Skills and technical know-how? i think we don't have enough of engineers trained in modern automation, programming, and digital integration to match our ambition in this regard.