1962: The first industrial
robot was online in a General Motors automobile factory in New Jersey.
It was Devol and Engelberger's UNIMATE. It performed spot welding and
extracted die castings.
1974: Industrial robots were
developed and installed in Fanuc factory. Dr. Inaba, President of FANUC
was rewarded with "the 6th Annual Memorial Award of Joseph Marie
Jacquard" by the American NC Society. The production and sale of DC
servo motors were started under GETTYS MANUFACTURING CO., INC license.
1977: The Motoman L10 was
introduced. It featured five axes and a maximum workload of 10 kg, which
included the gripper. It weighed 470kg. The Motoman L10 was the first
robot that Yaskawa introduced on the market.
1979: Nachi developed the
first motor-driven robots for spot welding.
1980: The industrial robot
industry starts its rapid growth, with a new robot or company entering
the market every month.
1981: Takeo Kanade builds the
direct drive arm. It is the first to have motors installed directly into
the joints of the arm. This change makes it faster and much more
accurate than previous robotic arms.
1985: OTC DAIHEN became the
official OEM supplier of robots to the Miller Electric Company. Miller
chose to assign different model numbers to the robots sold in the North
American market. The prefixed the letters in the model with "MR," for
Miller Robot. Miller no longer supports the robots that were
manufactured in this era. The Japanese models featured their own number
and name.
1987: ASEA of Vasteras, Sweden
(founded 1883) and BBC Brown Boveri Ltd of Baden, Switzerland, (founded
1891) announce plans to form ABB Asea Brown Boveri Ltd., headquartered
in Zurich, Switzerland. Each parent will hold 50 percent of the new
company.
1988: The Motoman ERC control
system was introduced with the ability to control up to 12 axes, more
than any other controller at the time.
1989: Nachi Technology Inc.,
U.S.A. is established.
1992: FANUC Robot School was
established. GM Fanuc Robotics Corporation was restructured to FANUC's
wholly owned share holding company, FANUC Robotics Corporation, together
with its subsidiaries, FANUC Robotics North America, Inc. and FANUC
Robotics Europe GmbH. A Prototype of the intelligent robot was built.
1994: The Motoman MRC control
system was introduced with the ability to control up to 21 axes. It
could also synchronize the motions of two robots.
1995: Miller departed from the
robotic business. OTC launched the Dynamic Robotic Division and moved
the headquarters to Ohio to focus on selling robots to new users.
1996: Nachi expands robotics
business, cutting tool, and bearing product ranges.
1998: The introduction of the
XRC controller allowed the control of up to 27 axes and the synchronized
control of three to four robots. The Motoman UP series introduced a
simpler robot arm that was more readily accessible for maintenance and
repair. Honda was instrumental in driving the development of both the UP
series of arms and the XRC arm control.
2003: OTC DAIHEN introduced
the Almega AX series, a line of arc welding and handling robots. The AX
series robots integrate seamlessly with the OTC D series welding power
supplies for advanced control capabilities.