Adept Technology
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Adept Technology, Inc. | |
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| Type | Public (NASDAQ: ADEP) |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1983 |
| Headquarters | Livermore, California, USA |
| Industry | Robotics |
| Slogan | Intelligent robotics for a global economy |
| Website | www.adept.com |
Adept Technology, located in Livermore, California, USA, was founded in 1983 and designs, manufactures, and markets industrial robots for the applications including automotive, food, electronic, semiconductor, pharmaceutical and medical devices, lab automation, solar, etc.
Adept's first major achievement was the AdeptOne family of direct drive SCARA robots. Their simple mechanics made them very robust and reliable. The Adept One robots were first introduced in 1984 and have been in production ever since, most recently as remanufactured arms. Some of these robots have seen well over 15 years of continual use without any significant performance issues.
Over the more then 2 decades of continued innovation in robotics and software and control, Adept introduced among others vision guidance and inspection, conveyor tracking, all integrated in one controller, the Adept SmartController CX (Adept Robot & Motion control). The CX controller builds the foundation of Adept's success, and allows not only multiple robots/axis to be run by one controller, but also the ability to run robot arms from a variety of other robot manufacturers.
In the table top SCARA robot category, Adept has the worlds fastest SCARA robot with the Adept Cobra. The Cobra robot is available in two versions, suitable to fit any application. The i-series Cobra features embedded controls in the base of the robot, while the s-series Cobra offers additional features with the CX controller. (Adept SCARA robots)
Other Adept robots include the Python, a linear axis (Cartesian) mechanism available in various configurations and lengths (Adept Python Configurator)
The Viper is Adept's six-axis robot offering. Also known as articualted robots, the Adept Viper comes in sizes reaching from 650 mm to 1700 mm. (Adept Viper)
Adept's latest product introduction is the Adept Quattro, and parallel high-speed picker robot, capable of reaching speeds of up to 240 pick-per-minute. Currently available as beta units, the Quattro is slated for full production release by Summer of 2007. (Adept Quattro parallel robot)
On the software side, Adept is recognized for its powerful robotic language, V+. Even though V+ doesn't bring much value on the general purpose OS-type functions (like file management, user interface...), it offers very nice and extensive tools for robotics application and manipulations: all functions about transformation and frames. For example, you can command the robot to move to a position relative to a belt and track it with a single instruction:
MOVE pos:%belt (Adept V+)
Adept also offers its own vision system, quite powerful, not too difficult to use and very well integrated with the motion part and the robot control (e.g. cross calibration).
