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Developed by a collaboration between industrial AI software firm IFS and mobile robot pioneer Boston Dynamics, the “end-to-end autonomous system” was revealed at the Industrial X Unleashed event in New York last week (13 November).
Designed to “revolutionise how asset-intensive organisations manage and optimise their field operations”, the system combines Boston Dynamics’ dog-like Spot robot with AI technology from IFS to streamline sensing, predictive decision making and actions in industrial settings.
“With labour and skills shortages impacting industrial customers, leading to service gaps and prolonged outages, there exists an urgent need for technology that can supplement field workers,” an IFS announcement said.
Spot robots, already deployed at some industrial sites, are designed to capture critical operational data. They use thermal cameras to detect overheating, can listen to air or gas leaks, read analogue gauges for pressure and flow, check indicator lights, identify hazards such as spills and detect voltage anomalies. This information will feed directly to an agentic AI from IFS, which will analyse the data, make decisions and trigger appropriate actions, creating what IFS called a “seamless loop from sensing to execution”.
The collaboration focuses on industries where field operations are critical, including manufacturing, energy, utilities, mining and other asset-intensive sectors, which the partners said had been “underserved” by generic AI applications. The system is designed to improve safety, efficiency and asset uptime by reducing human exposure to hazardous environments and making quicker decisions.
“Asset-intensive organisations face unrelenting pressure to improve operational performance. Together with Boston Dynamics, we’re delivering a truly autonomous system that connects the physical and digital worlds,” said Christian Pedersen, chief product officer at IFS.
“IFS.ai and IFS Loops turn robot observations into enterprise action, from preventative maintenance scheduling to predictive failure analysis and automated anomaly detection. Data flows from the field into enterprise systems, decisions are made autonomously and actions are executed back in the field, all within a single integrated platform.”
The collaboration “represents the future of industrial operations,” said Dr Merry Frayne, director of products at Boston Dynamics. “Our robots excel at navigating complex environments and gathering critical data. Combined with IFS’s agentic decision-making capabilities, we’re enabling organisations to achieve levels of operational excellence and safety that simply weren’t possible before.”
IFS customers include New England energy provider Eversource. CIO Ron Utterbeck said: “As our grid continues to advance, we need to utilise not only traditional data gathering but more advanced data gathering and modelling.
“To meet the reliability and the energy demands for our customers, we look forward to the opportunity in utilising advanced industry technology to enable data collection at a different level that can support routine inspections of substations and facilities with automatically prioritising and dispatching our crews. This will allow our highly skilled crews to be focused on the right priorities at the right time and ensure mission-critical work is completed. It’s a genuine shift from reactive to predictive maintenance.”
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