High-end robotics computing technology on show at ESEC 2017

congatec's new hardware virtualised platforms improve the integration of previously stand-alone robotics systems and build the fundament for the next-gen of smart, cyber-physical controlled systems and deep learning humanoid robots. They also increase the utilisation of costly hardware while reducing investments as well as operational costs through lower energy consumption.

"Japanese robotics and automation vendors and German embedded real-time computer vendors are predestined to form an outstanding cooperation to generate most innovative high quality robotics and real-time control systems. We are therefore very excited about the Hannover Declaration of close cooperation between Japan and German industry announced at this year's CeBIT fair. This spirit of collaboration will accelerate our support for Japanese robotics and automation vendors, enabling them to stay on top of both the global humanoid and industrial robotics market as well as connected industrial and medical systems," explained congatec CEO Jason Carlson.

The application ready combination of embedded boards and computer-on-modules from congatec with real-time hypervisor technology from Real-Time Systems is suited for connected robotics, industrial machine controls and medical systems. Engineers benefit from application ready and functionally validated real time platforms that significantly reduce their verification and validation efforts; a comprehensive documentation package that is ready for own certifications; and personal integration support that does not stop at driver or library settings but delivers the entire real-time capable, virtualisation ready platform. Together, these benefits enable engineers to most efficiently exploit the full congatec multi-core embedded board and computer-on-module range, from Intel Atom, Celeron and Pentium processors (codename Apollo Lake) up to Intel Core and Xeon D processors (Codename Kaby Lake) and AMD G-Series and R-Series, for their various applications.

In a demo system congatec showcases the world's first virtualised robotics server platform built on the innovative COM Express Type 7 server-on-module standard recently launched by the PICMG. This brand new next generation server platform enables application specific designs of industrial edge and fog severs technologies at lowest customisation cost. The hardware virtualised server hosts the PLC control for the robot, the HMI for the operator, the IoT gateway for remote/mobile monitoring and maintenance as well as the powerful 10GbE Industry 4.0 gateway for real-time collaboration of machinery in cyber-physical smart factories. Big Data storage is hosted on PCIe connected SSDs in highly efficient and secure RAID-5 configuration. Predictive maintenance analytics of system fans and SSDs are executed by the rule engine of congatec's new cloud API for IoT gateways. The system's cloud is virtualised on the IoT gateway partition as well. It can also be automatically mirrored to central clouds.