Innovative control of assembly systems and lines

The increasing demand for flexibility and reconfigurability of assembly lines generates new challenges for the control of these lines and their subsystems, such as robots, grippers, conveyors or automated guided vehicles. Also new requirements for their interaction between each other and the environment as well as with humans arise. On the other hand the rapid change of information and communication technology opens new potentials for innovative control. Due to the high degree of interconnection between controllers, actuators and sensors, the classical automation pyramid is replaced by networked structures with a higher degree of flexibility, but also higher complexity. This trend is supported by the ability to collect and process data within cloud environments, the rapid increase of computational power of decentralized and embedded controllers and the high potential of machine learning for automation. This keynote gives an overview of innovative approaches in ICT and robotics for flexible control and automation of assembly lines and systems.