Technology Transfer Award for Ubica Robotics - Startup

We are celebrating an important award with the robotics start-up Ubica Robotics, which was spun off from the IAI. Together with the University of Bremen and dmTech GmbH, Ubica Robotics has received the euRobotics Technology Transfer Award 2022 at the European Robotics Forum in Rotterdam, which took place last week from June 28 to 30 in Rotterdam.

The euRobotics Technology Transfer Award, now in its 18th edition, honors outstanding examples of technology transfer in robotics and automation resulting from collaboration between research and industry.

The start-up Ubica Robotics was founded in 2020 by Ferenc Bálint-Benczédi, Georg Bartels, Alexis Maldonado and Jonas Reiling as a spin-off of the University of Bremen. The foundation of the start-up is based on the research work of its founders within the framework of the H2020 research project “Robotics Enabling Fully-Integrated Logistics Lines for Supermarkets” (REFILLS), which was funded by the EU Commission. Ubica Robotics’ founders used the knowledge gained in the REFILLS project as the basis for the development of their robots.

The transition from prototype to production has been successful: since moving into the premises of Schuppen 1 in Bremen's Überseestadt district, the start-up has been growing steadily and already has robots working on a daily basis at customers’ stores.

Every night after closing, Ubica's scanning UB5 robots roam autonomously through retail stores to capture, recognize and identify the stores' inventory, creating and updating the stores' digital twins on a daily basis.

Based on these digital twins, which represent an accurate 3D digital image of the store, inventory management can be optimized in several ways: Customers and employees can find products more quickly, shelf gaps can be identified and closed early and stocktaking can be simplified. Overall, the use of the inventory robot promises to result in time savings and cost savings.

With their wide range of applications in the retail sector, Ubica’s robots occupy a unique position in Germany. Competition for them comes primarily from the United States, where more lenient privacy laws do not restrict robots to after-hours use.

For more information about UBICA, visit their website