PROACTIVE ASSEMBLY SYSTEMS-REALIZING THE POTENTIAL OF HUMAN COLLABORATION WITH AUTOMATION

AbstractManufacturing competitiveness relies on the companies' ability to rapidly reconfigure their assembly systems. This paper introduces assembly system proactivity, a concept based on interrelated levels of human involvement, automation, and information handling. Increased and structured human involvement contributes to increased system ability to proactively address predicted and unpredicted events. Correct involvement of human operators will utilize the fully combined potential of human and technical capabilities, providing cost-efficient assembly system solutions. The ProAct project is developing proactive assembly system models and evaluating proactive, feature-based solutions. Focus is on realizing the potential of cost-efficient and semi-automated systems with relevant human involvement, i.e. highly skilled operators that add flexibility and functionality.