Support for fruit farmers: mobile robots harvest apples

"Both companies are contributing one of their most innovative new developments for automation in fruit growing to this cooperation. With KUKA, we have an absolute specialist with many years of experience and sophisticated know-how in the field of robotics at our side. The result is a practiceoriented collaboration that will provide us with many valuable insights for our next development steps with regard to automation in fruit growing. In the future, we want to test and further develop the interaction of our equipment and exploit synergies, especially with regard to apple cultivation. We are very much looking forward to this," says founder and Managing Director Josef Schmidt of digital workbench gmbh.

Compared to a conventional gripper, the vacuum suction cup can distribute the pressure more evenly over the surface of the apple and thus avoid unwanted pressure points. Cameras recognize important parameters such as ripeness, condition and size and, of course, the position of the apple. The carrier platform presented at the trade fair impresses above all with its high performance and almost endless multifunctionality. In addition, the Tipard 1800 takes digitization and automation to a whole new level.