Result IFOY Test Report for vehicle software ARCOS
At the Test Camp Intralogistics 2023 everything revolves around innovations in intralogistics. At the TEST DAYS, finalists completed the IFOY audit, among them DS Automotion with the software solution ARCOS. The results from the innovation check and the evaluation of the expert jury are very promising to bring the coveted IFOY Winner award to Austria on June 22, 2023.
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IFOY test report by the expert jury
Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV) are known for the tireless execution of their transport orders. They travel rigidly predefined routes and deliver the respective transport loads to their destinations. Each lane, curve or intersection is carefully planned to realize the highest possible efficiency of the system. Mutual obstruction of the vehicles or even blocking is thereby ruled out.
Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMR), on the other hand, are responsible for achieving their own goals. They are often only provided with the target and a map of the operational environment. With the help of sensors, they then continuously record their surroundings and can react independently to changes. Planning their paths independently allows them to avoid obstacles, but carries the risk that decisions made may negatively affect the efficiency of the overall system. The individual vehicles can interfere with or even block each other.
It is understandable that for plant operators it is tempting to use the positive features of both worlds. Therefore, the DS Automotion company has combined the strengths of both worlds (AMR and AGV), setting a milestone in the industry. According to the operator's requirements, vehicles can act autonomously and avoid obstacles without blocking, but also follow pre-planned lanes.
The innovations are not only characterized by the coining of the terms "plannable autonomy" and "cooperative navigation", as new core functions of the vehicle software. Conformity with the VDA-5050 interface, which is used across fleets, is also worth highlighting.
"Schedulable autonomy" is a way to navigate vehicles both "virtually lane-guided" and autonomously. The basic building blocks for this are the autonomy zones in which vehicles move freely.
"Cooperative navigation" describes the ability of autonomously navigating vehicles to work together to find solutions to problematic situations. For example, the vehicles independently clarify the right of way between vehicles at intersections or bottlenecks.
IFOY test conclusion
With the new software, DS Automotion vehicles can be integrated quickly and easily into production or logistics processes. In combination with the NAVIOS fleet manager, the planning and integration effort is reduced via the web-based interface. The zone-based planning and transport flow editor included in it enable the operator to adapt and expand the system. Transportation systems that use AMR with full autonomy typically have limited ability to intervene in the process. Here, the "schedulable autonomy" functions offer the possibility to define the behavior of the vehicles more precisely. As in the case of virtual lane-guided AGVs, complex systems are thus realized with the highest possible efficiency. Due to the standardized interface, the operator can integrate the system into an already existing plant with VDA-5050 interface and also expand it at any time.
IFOY Innovation Check
Marktrelevanz
The vehicle software ARCOS combines the high flexibility of Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMR) with the high efficiency of track guided transport vehicles (AGV) in one transport system. As more and more warehouses, production facilities, and hospitals are equipped with transport vehicles and flexibility requirements become more demanding in terms of throughput, environment, and task structure, solutions like ARCOS are an important step in getting the best possible performance out of automated transport systems. Due to the breadth of application fields and the open interfaces of ARCOS, the market potential is estimated to be quite high. A first customer installation in the hospital environment is to go into operation shortly.
Customer benefits
With its so-called "Plannable Autonomy", ARCOS promises maximum transport process efficiency by optimally merging the advantages of track-guided and autonomous transport vehicles in one vehicle software. However, the degree of autonomy can so far only be defined in spatially delimited zones, but not on the basis of other, situational criteria. In addition, "collaborative navigation" in autonomous operation ensures that the optimal driving behavior between the vehicles is coordinated independently at intersections or bottlenecks and that blockages are ruled out. ARCOS is compatible with all fleet managers, can also be used across manufacturers via VDA 5050, and can also be used in fleets with more than 100 vehicles.
Novelty / Innovation
Plannable autonomy, i.e. the seamless integration of lane guidance, partial autonomy and free navigation in one vehicle software is new in this quality of integration in one solution. Although collaborative navigation is not an entirely new function, it is not coordinated centrally as in other solutions, but solved decentrally only by the robots involved. Innovative dynamic lock zones are also used in this context.
Functionality / type of implementation
The functionalities of the plannable autonomy as well as the collaborative navigation proved to be of high quality and robust in several, partly very demanding tests. The collaborative navigation can also resolve difficult and dynamic situations and coordinate any number of vehicles with each other. One limitation of decentralized evasion planning, however, is the operational range within a radius of about 10 meters. The applicability of ARCOS on all common chassis kinematics is exemplary.
Conclusion
ARCOS makes it possible for the first time to have AGV and AMR fleets drive variably zone-based between fixed lane guidance, lane guidance with flexible evasion, and free navigation (plannable autonomy) with a single flexible vehicle software. In combination with cooperative navigation, which enables the robots to avoid each other in a coordinated manner, a very efficient, powerful and high-quality solution is offered that can also integrate vehicles from other manufacturers via VDA 5050.