Enhancing productivity to sustain manufacturing

BW Industrie is a company specializing in industrial degreasing and machining of mechanical parts. For the past eight years, the company has used Universal Robots’ cobots to improve several of its manufacturing processes.

Four robotic arms from Universal Robots (one UR5, two UR10 and one model of the new UR16e) are deployed on production lines. The cobots handle tasks such as loading and unloading of CNC lathes, quality control of metallic tubes and deburring of metal parts ranging from 4 to 14 kg.

The business transformation

Using cobots from Universal Robots enables BW Industrie to maintain competitiveness and increase its workforce by 50% and revenues by 70%. The company has also been able to reduce the risk of muscoskeletal disorders (MSDs) among employees, ensuring a healthier working environment.

BW Industrie is an industrial SME located in Moselle, in the Eastern part of France. Eight years ago, the company was facing increasing competition. In order to save itself from relocation, BWIndustrie decided to embrace automation. The company first deployed traditional industrial robots requiring safety caging but wanted the operators to have access to the robots during production. The company was looking for a collaborative robotic solution that was intuitive and simple to implement. With an easy-to-use cobot, operators could be trained quickly and take care of day-to-day maintenance. In this context, BW Industrie acquired its first UR5 cobot.

Subsequently, with the expansion of the Universal Robots product line of cobots, BW Industrie deployed two UR10 cobots and developed machining cells for different applications. In order to meet customer demands for deburring of heavy metal parts, BW Industrie became the first company worldwide to integrate the UR16e cobot from Universal Robots.