Towards Easy Robot System Integration: Challenges and Future Directions

The amount of robots in industry is increasing, pushing the need for easier configuration and integration of robots. The cost of robot integration is often larger than the cost of the robots themselves. With the increasing complexity of robotic systems and the tasks they perform, the future of reducing the expenses of robot system integration is significant. In this position paper, we report on some of the main challenges in robot system configuration, and give an overview of the current state-of-the-art of robot system configuration. We briefly look into the configuration of personal computers (PCs) and study how the robot system configuration can be improved inspired by the standards used in the PC area. We conclude with concrete proposals as to what can be done in the future, to make the process of robot system configuration and integration easier and cheaper.