{"id":1737,"date":"2017-10-13T16:36:39","date_gmt":"2017-10-13T15:36:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/engineernewsnetwork.com\/blog\/?p=1737"},"modified":"2017-10-13T16:36:39","modified_gmt":"2017-10-13T15:36:39","slug":"robotics-programming-online-academy-offers-free-interactive-modules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.engineernewsnetwork.com\/blog\/robotics-programming-online-academy-offers-free-interactive-modules\/","title":{"rendered":"Robotics programming: online academy offers free interactive modules"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>More than 14,000 users from 132 countries have joined the Universal Robots Academy<\/a><\/span> to become robot programmers.<\/p>\n

Adding to its basic training, the Academy is now launching three new modules that focus on mastering more advanced features of collaborative robots.<\/p>\n

Universal Robots, the pioneer and market leader of collaborative robots, introduced the online learning platform, Universal Robots<\/a><\/span> Academy, to ensure that everybody with a desire to learn the concepts of cobots gets the introduction necessary to master basic programming skills.<\/p>\n

The company is now expanding the online training, adding three new modules that step up complexity by teaching users how to create and work with coordinate systems, variables and conditional statements, and how to use the robot\u2019s wizard to easily create a program for packaging.<\/p>\n

CTO and co-founder of Universal Robots, Esben \u00d8stergaard, explains that it is unusual in the industry to make a robot training curriculum of this calibre available for free: \u201cThis is a long-term investment for us. We want to raise the robot literacy and the reason for speeding up the entry of cobots is not only to optimize production here and now.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are facing a looming skills gap in the manufacturing industry that we need to bridge by all means possible. Facilitating knowledge creation and access to our robots is an important step in that direction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stefan Stubgaard, Head of Global Competence Centre at Universal Robots, adds that the Academy modules have received positive feedback from users around the world: \u201cThis learning resource is now also reaching small and medium-sized manufacturers that up until now regarded robotics as costly and complex,\u201d says Stefan Stubgaard. \u201cBy simply logging into the Academy they experience first-hand how simple the setup can be and they can easily envisage what production tasks could be automated with our cobots.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the early adopters of Universal Robots Academy is the Whirlpool Corporation where the Universal Robots Academy modules now provide the basic foundation for all UR robot training at the company\u2019s plant in Ohio, USA.<\/p>\n

Tim Hossler, Controls Engineer at Whirlpool, emphasizes the great convenience of being able to offer this resource to employees in-house: \u201cNow we don\u2019t have to wait and send them out for basic training elsewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe modules can be completed at our own pace and we can even pick and choose which modules we offer different personnel depending on skill sets and their level of interaction with the robots,\u201d says Tim Hossler. \u201cI really like the interactive approach, it makes learning very hands-on and transferable to what we would actually be doing here at our plant. I was also pleasantly surprised that the modules were free of charge for anyone to use. It definitely increases the accessibility of the UR robots.\u201d
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