AUTOMATION
WWW.MADEIN.IE « SEPTEMBER 2020 « 27
“The Hyve is an autonomous,
collaborative robotic platform
conceptualised to serve the consumer and
life science industries and we have found
huge scope for it already in the cosmetics
market.”
The unique, compact footprint of The
Hyve allows extensive factory or laboratory
processes to be integrated and automated.
The co-bot mounted in the centre console,
allows the entire bench area plus the
additional 3D-space above the bench-area
to be accessed. Racking systems and the
precise six-axis robot allows the most
inaccessible space to be accessed.
Additional free-space under the platform
itself and within each Hyve segment, allow
much of the Siemens infrastructure and
additional equipment / instruments to be
installed under the top-surface maximising
the available work-area. In effect, Hyve is its
own 4-story super-structure for processes
and ancillary equipment installation.
Hyve is configured using Siemens Simatic
S7-1200, S7-1500 and the WinCC Open
Architecture technologies. They are
embedded in the fundamental mechanism
and performance of the Hyve platform.
Hyve was created using open architecture
and thanks to the Siemens interfaces which
allows communication with third party
equipment is easily scalable and can even be
accessed remotely for Over-the-Air updates,
system diagnostics and/or performance
indicators.
Alwyn Jones, Head of Pharmaceutical &
Life Science, UK & Ireland at Siemens
Digital Industries, says: “Working on a
project like this has helped us
solidify the Siemens and Applied
Integration UK Ltd partnership.
The Hyve has been well
received by industry peers and
was showcased in the last
quarter of 2019 by special
invitation at a leadership event
arranged by a global
Pharmaceutical manufacturer.”
Hyve can be a stand-alone
stand-alone system
or operate together
in a Beehive-like
architecture to form a
system or operate together in a
Hyve can be a
production line,
or a complete
laboratory suite
Beehive-like architecture to form a
production line, or a complete laboratory
suite making it a paradigm shift in
flexibility, modularity and configurability
for such a robot platform in the market
today.
The Hyve robot platform is designed to
work alongside humans as a collaborative
robot or co-bot and the sheer versatility of
it means it can be configured for a variety of
roles. Hyve can play a larger role to support
human activity at a plant in areas such as
packaging & palletising and even support
traditional laboratory automation processes
usually confined to more dedicated
equipment.
The Hyve autonomous, collaborative
robotic platform is designed to work inside
traditional laboratories without the need for
clumsy programming tools and large
safety-cage constructions. The operator is
perfectly safe and able to interact with the
co-bot in ways unimaginable previously. The
co-bot at the heart of The Hyve™ complies
with the all the safety requirements for the
collaboration of humans and robots and as
specified in ISO 10218 and ISO/TS 15066.
Since its installation in one of the world’s
leading beauty, cosmetics and personal care
companies, it is being used for product
stability.
“By introducing The Hyve to the laboratory
testing arena it has helped in stability studies
and extracting analytics that were otherwise
impossible or took 10 times longer,” added
Lofthouse. “Previously data was available to
the operations team after two to three years.
This is significantly reduced, results now seen
in to two to three months! The impact of
environmental conditions and accelerated
testing scenarios on the product is crucial,
ensuring quality manufactured goods are
developed having the longevity and shelf-life
required by both manufacturer and the
consumer.
Lofthouse further explained that in the
manufacture process it is important to have a
complete understanding how the product will
react under defined conditions such as
sunlight, mechanical vibration and
temperature variations etc. and that the
deployment of The Hyve, has helped ensure
that products are not produced with any
chemical imbalances.
The use of Simatic S7-1200 and S7-1500
allows simple, standardised and secure
connectivity across all levels. This software
solution is vendor- and platform-independent
OPC Unified Architecture (UA), the
communication standard for Industry 4.0 and
the standard mechanism for vertical
communication and the horizontal data
exchange between machines to machines
(M2M).
Applied Scientific Technologies is currently
working in the factory on further
deployments and totally new applications.
“While early adopters and deployments for
Hyve have focusedw on cosmetic products
and packaging, we have produced the Hyve
with a view for use in the more regulated
industries such as pharmaceuticals making it
ideal for deployment in pharmaceutical
laboratories or manufacturing” added
Lofthouse signalling that there was yet
another untapped market for Hyve. MADE
/WWW.MADEIN.IE