Rockwell Automation has collaborated with the robot-maker Kuka to develop a controller that allows Kuka’s PA robots to be controlled by Rockwell’s ControlLogix PACs (programmable automation controllers).

The development, which is being unveiled at the Pack Expo packaging exhibition in Chicago at the end of October, will provide an open architecture system with a single programming environment (Rockwell’s RSLogix 5000) and one PAC to control an entire machine. The developers say that it will deliver productivity gains throughout a machine’s lifecycle, will simplify the automation architecture by standardising control components, and will provide operators with a familiar user-machine interface.

“The industry has been asking for a system like this for years and we are proud to be delivering the first-ever unified controller,” says James Cooper, Kuka’s vice-president for sales and marketing in the US. “It was all made possible through an integrated robotic solution, allowing the Kuka PA robot arm to be controlled directly from a Rockwell Automation ControlLogix controller.”