Yokogawa and ANYbotics Join Forces on Integrated Robot Inspection for Industry
- ANYbotics’ autonomous inspection robots will now be managed directly through Yokogawa’s OpreX plant control platform.
- The integration enables unified oversight of both standard and explosion-proof robots across hazardous industrial sites.
Yokogawa, a Japanese automation company, and ANYbotics, a Swiss robotics firm, have announced a partnership to combine plant operations software with autonomous robotic inspection. The goal is to help industrial operators manage mixed fleets of robots, including those rated for explosive environments, through a single interface. The companies are targeting sectors like oil and gas, power, and metals, where hazardous conditions make manual inspection costly and risky.
The joint solution integrates Yokogawa’s OpreX Robot Management Core software with ANYbotics’ ANYmal robots, four-legged, autonomous platforms built specifically for industrial inspection. These quadrupeds are equipped with high-end sensors for tasks like gas leak detection and thermal monitoring, and can operate in both indoor and outdoor environments. ANYmal D handles general industrial sites, while ANYmal X is the world’s first explosion-proof legged robot, certified for ATEX and IECEx Zone 1 use.
The companies plan to target energy markets in Asia and the Middle East, where demand for autonomous inspection is growing. ANYbotics has already conducted several deployments of its ANYmal X prototype, with a full launch expected later this year. Yokogawa says the system will be backed by its global network and may extend into other digital inspection tools.
🌀 Tom’s Take:
This partnership makes it possible to manage autonomous inspection robots through the same systems used to run industrial plants. It’s a practical move toward automating routine inspection in hazardous environments.
Source: Yokogawa
