Remote Access: In-house or External for Smart Robotics?

Smart Robotics was founded in 2015, aiming to develop smart, flexible, safe and user-friendly robot solutions. With its three business units — Packaging, Logistics and Incubator — Smart Robotics serves different markets, both in the Netherlands and abroad. After it was founded, Smart Robotics immediately started thinking about remote access.

'It is very important to us that we can remotely access all our systems, to see how they’re behaving,' Heico Sandee, Managing Director at Smart Robotics, says. Consequently, Smart Robotics aims to get in touch as soon as something goes wrong, way before the customer can reach out to them.

An incredibly quick implementation of a secure connection to our robots.'

_{Heico Sandee Managing Director at Smart Robotics} 

Aligned philosophy

Smart Robotics first considered whether they should develop their own solution, or if it was better to outsource the development and look for an external partner. Confidence in the ability to setup a highly secure connection turned out to be of utmost importance for Smart Robotics. 'Securely collecting the data and getting remote access to our systems,' Heico explains. 'In a way that the customer is confident that there won’t be a security breach as a result of an open network.'

That’s why Smart Robotics decided not to develop their own solution. They chose IXON as their trusted partner to guarantee a secure connection from their robots to the cloud. 'We strive for high flexibility by implementing a fairly complex system, which should be user-friendly for our customers. That’s exactly what IXON does as well, so our philosophy is nicely aligned,' says Heico. The short communication lines, the ability to quickly act and the willingness to make adjustments are also seen as big advantages.

We even receive the gathered data from all robots via the IXON Cloud

_{Heico Sandee Managing Director at Smart Robotics}

When a robot, which is standardly equipped with an IXrouter, has a failure, Smart Robotics can easily log in to the system remotely. 'We can take control of the system and immediately help the customer find a suitable solution,' Heico explains. Additionally, new software for the robot is released every month. 'We also do these updates via the IXON platform,' Heico says. 'We even receive the statistics of the data gathered from all robots via the IXON Cloud.'

Connectivity everywhere - even in China

Smart Robotics recognises that it would’ve taken much more time to set up their own solution. 'We had everything up and running in no time. An incredibly quick implementation of a secure connection to our robots,' Heico says about the collaboration with IXON. Because of the solution, Smart Robotics is saved quite some headaches.

'You just put the Plug and Play router in your control cabinet, and it works. All over the world, even in China,' says Heico. 'We have relatively few discussions with customers about security as it is the responsibility of IXON, who have made it their profession.'

An ambitious vision for the future makes Smart Robotics stand out from other system integrators. The ultimate goal is to deliver a ready-made package with an autostart manual. The real added value, according to Heico, is the connectivity. 'We try to minimise the use of hardware in our systems,' Heico explains.

'For the future, I would like for a program that runs on our pc.' IXON offers plenty of opportunities for this. In the near future, Smart Robotics will be looking to discuss the options of an embedded solution with IXON. This will save them even more time and costs. 'That’s one less piece of hardware,' concludes Heico.

Benefits IXON Cloud offers Smart Robotics:

• Fast implementation of remote service
• Security warranted by external partner
• Secure, plug & play solution
• Data insights from their robots
• Global coverage

Want to know more about remote access with IXON Cloud? 

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