Mantis Robotics Certifies Fenceless High-Speed Industrial Robot
Mantis Robotics has achieved safety certification for what it calls the world's first industrial robot designed to operate at high speeds without a physical safety fence. The certification enables closer human-robot collaboration in manufacturing and logistics. The company stated the development lays the foundation for the safe deployment of AI-driven and humanoid robots in industrial environments.
- The Mantis MR-1 robot has received safety certification for ISO 10218-1, the international standard for industrial robot safety, and ISO 13849-1, a foundational standard for the safety of control systems in machinery. - To operate without a fence, the robot uses a proprietary technology called "Physical AI" and an embedded sensor suite to perceive its surroundings in 3D, detect moving objects, and adjust its path in real-time to avoid collisions. This system, known as Mantis SafetyCore, powers the range-based object detection. - The MR-1 is engineered with 47 embedded safety functions, a significant increase from the 17 found in many other collaborative robots, and all of these features are certified to Performance Level d (PL=d), indicating a high degree of reliability. - Unlike many collaborative robots that must slow down or stop when a human enters the workspace, the MR-1 is designed for high-speed operation, with a maximum speed of 10 m/s, while still allowing for human presence. - The company was founded in 2020 by Gerry Vannuffelen and is headquartered in San Francisco. It has secured significant funding from investors including Emerald Technology Ventures and the Amazon Industrial Innovation Fund. - Mantis Robotics' deployment software utilizes a 3D real-time "Digital Twin" and a code-free programming environment, which can reduce the total cost of ownership for robotic systems by as much as 75%.
