European Robotics Forum, held annually in various vibrant European cities, stands as one of the most influential robotics events in Europe, bringing together researchers, industry professionals, and policymakers to discuss the latest advancements, challenges, and opportunities in the field of robotics.

This year, Husarion proudly showcased its well-proven robust mobile robotic platforms - Panther and ROSbot XL - at ERF 2024 in Rimini, Italy, captivating a broad audience of European robotics professionals and innovators.

If you didn’t have a chance to meet us in person, make sure to check out the short description of the solutions we presented and take a look at the video from our booth. And if you have any questions about our solutions, don’t hesitate to drop us an email at contact@husarion.com.

Like many other robotics companies, we use Docker to package and deploy ROS software in our robots. While Docker served us well, its complexities and constraints began impacting our ability to scale and secure our software deployments efficiently. We needed a more streamlined solution.

This blog presents the journey we took exploring snaps as a deployment infrastructure. We wrote this blog to help others facing the same challenges with Docker, and to show how you can take the first steps towards an improved deployment infrastructure and a more security-compliant approach.

Autonomous navigation with real-time traffic analysis, supported by 5G technology and applied to the spacious mobile robot based on Husarion Panther. This is the combination that - starting from next year - will allow the myLOG system to deliver purchased goods right to the door of Strausberg residents, enabling them to order from local shops with door-to-door service.

Whizzy, as this is the name of an autonomous delivery robot developed by the consortium, has recently successfully completed its first test drive in the wild, demonstrating its capabilities and generating enthusiastic media coverage.

What is the motivation behind this project and what major challenges are yet to be faced by the platform constructors?

There is no greener industry than agriculture, right? While this claim may seem intuitive, current data reveals that land use related to agriculture contributes to as much as 10% of global CO2 emissions. With the escalating global climate crisis, the need to reduce agricultural emissions has become more pressing than ever.

But what if instead of drastically limiting emissions, we could just use the natural process of photosynthesis to address the challenge and actively remove CO2 from the atmosphere? Plants inherently capture carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, and the carbon they trap can be transformed into soil organic carbon - a phenomenon known as carbon sequestration.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), also known as drones, are used nowadays in a wide variety of applications, exploring zones affected by natural disasters, surveilling, or transporting packages in urban areas. While drones provide opportunities previously unavailable, such as the ability to easily traverse rough terrain, quickly and efficiently explore unknown areas, and possess excellent communication capabilities, they also come with their own limitations. UAVs have a reduced flight time due to low battery capacity and cannot carry heavy payloads, including more powerful computers, heavy sensors, or manipulators.

These constraints can be overcome by developing cooperation between drones and Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs), which offer higher payload and battery capacity. Simultaneously, UGVs can benefit from drones' greater range of sensors and higher traversability of difficult terrain. In scenarios where the drone and mobile robot cooperate to map and navigate unknown terrain, there is potential for achieving much higher efficiency in specific tasks, creating a whole new realm of possible applications.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a robot that simply follows you around, carrying your heavy backpack, groceries or whatever else you need to transport? And what if such solutions were available for industry, allowing construction workers and operators in logistics to be relieved from transporting heavy cargo and freeing their hands to perform more meaningful tasks?

Founded in 2015 by the Piaggio Group, Piaggio Fast Forward (or PFF for short) is a company that recognizes this challenge, developing cutting-edge technology for human following, aiming to improve mobility for the entire human-built environment, from workplaces to pedestrian use.

Husarion Panther is a heavy-duty, autonomous mobile robotic platform designed to perform in the most challenging applications. We want to allow our clients to concentrate on developing their innovative solutions based on Panther without wasting unnecessary time figuring out how to handle our robot or integrate it with external components. That’s why our developers work hard to ensure that your experience with Panther is smooth, safe, and intuitive, allowing you to start working with our robot right away.

With the latest release of Panther ROS Driver v1.1.0, we have introduced a bunch of new features to enhance user experience and safety, including:

• A new panther_manager based on BehaviorTree.CPP, which allows you to easily control the robot’s behavior in real-time and debug it on a visual interface.
• A velocity smoother for better control of the robot’s movement and an extended Kalman filter configuration for improved odometry information.
• Enhanced reporting on battery state and efficient handling of hardware-related errors based on the compatibility with the robot’s predefined configuration.

This fall, Husarion is excited to exhibit and engage in an idea exchange during the 2023 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2023) in Detroit, USA.

Held from October 1-5, IROS is a forum for the international robotics research community, emphasizing future directions and the latest approaches, designs, and outcomes. The theme of IROS 2023, “The Next Generation of Robotics,” will be reflected in plenary and keynote talks, workshops, tutorials, forums, competitions, tours, technical sessions, and… exhibitor stands.

Drop by our booth 418 to see our products in action:

• Panther - an industrial grade outdoor AMR, this time with a docking station and a web user interface in Foxglove,
• ROSbot XL - a universal, ROS 2-native mobile robot platform, showcasing autonomous mapping & navigation and mobile manipulation with OpenMANIPULATOR-X,
• Husarnet - a low-latency peer-to-peer VPN for next gen robotic fleets.

We all know that limiting CO2 emissions is one of the most urgent goals we face today. But what if I tell you that, at this point, limiting emissions simply isn't enough, and we must also start actively removing CO2 from the atmosphere? What’s more, with regulations introduced in recent years, carbon removal is no longer just a matter of social responsibility, but it has become a business necessity for many companies. The price of emitting one tonne of CO2 is almost €95 in the European Union and $51 in the USA, creating both an ecological and business need to develop efficient carbon removal techniques. Unfortunately, most carbon removal techniques are expensive, do not generate financial profit for the companies and produce waste instead of a useful outcome.

But what if companies could remove carbon, thus reducing CO2 emissions, without incurring costs? What if they could actually use the removed carbon for something useful and profitable instead of discarding it? This idea stands behind the project of Rock-Farm, a business that provides services of carbon removal by… building rock walls. What’s even more interesting, they do it fully autonomously, using Panther as a base for their masonry robot.

Husarion Panther is a heavy-duty robot designed for a variety of outdoor use cases across agriculture, logistics, mining, and other industries, so we do everything to ensure that its performance is stable and resilient even in the most demanding conditions. This requires not only robust construction, well-designed electronics, and sufficient IP protection rate, but also reliable and efficient software.

That’s why we are pleased to announce the release of Panther v1.0.0 ROS driver - an updated version of Panther software stack, optimized for safety, performance and enhanced user experience, both when working with the physical robot and with its simulation.

In this article, we will dig into the new features of Panther introduced in this release, including:

• new LED animation system that enables you to signal complex Panther behavior easily and efficiently
• a revised version of the URDF model of Panther
• changes for optimized safety and performance.

Let’s get started!