Humanoid construction robots, designed to carry out various site tasks, could be available en masse as a service early in the next decade.
Detailed plans for such robots were revealed at a recent humanoid robot summit, led by Vassos Chrysostomou, founder of IBE Humanoids. He is also the founder and managing partner of sister business IBE Partnership, which has helped bring ConstructCO2, the Nialli visual planner and Aiforsite to market.
Chrysostomou wants to establish a consortium, pulling together academics, construction industry leaders, and software and hardware developers, to develop a multi-tasking/multi-skilled labour platform (a so-called “workforce multiplier”) and bring it to market.
Leo, as the humanoid robot is named, will undertake tasks that are hazardous, repetitive, physically demanding, or undesirable for humans, as well as tasks that rely on consistency, monitoring or operation outside normal human working hours. Chrysostomou emphasised that Leo will augment rather than replace human judgement, skill and responsibility.
“We want industry leaders to join us and inspire [Leo], define it, develop it, test it, take it apart, make it sure it works with [construction industry] processes and workflows, and on the projects to make sure that when the robot’s ready to go out on a construction site, it actually begins to add value from day one,” he said.
Stage-by-stage development
An advisory board to plot the robot’s development roadmap will need to be convened. As Leo is developed, it will also need to be trained.
To develop and bring Leo to market, substantial capital investment will be required. Chrysostomou said: “In the development stage, we’re planning to tap into Innovate UK and EU funding. We want industry, whoever is going to come on board, to support us in kind and in commitments.
“We were thinking of developing a tier-based monthly subscription (three or four different tiers, subject to turnover, vision and capabilities) for the industry to engage with us. We’re also open to bespoke arrangements – everything is on the table.”
He envisions a roll-out, backed by mass production, “in 2030 onwards”. He imagines Leo being supplied to the wider industry ‘as a service’ with a subscription-based model that could be based on hourly, weekly, monthly or even task-specific or output-specific rates.
The humanoid robot summit was supported by the likes of the National Federation of Builders, Cranfield University, University of Warwick, Constructionarium and Innovate UK. It attracted not only academics and robotics developers, but also large and medium-sized contractors (including Mace, Laing O’Rourke and Baxall Construction).
Read the full story at Digital Construction Plus.
