ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

German correspondent Alexandra Lachner speaks to engineering association VDMA about robotics.

“Things are happening in the world of robotics at the moment – many of our members are making substantial investments in order to bring good products on to the market. The demand for driverless cleaning machines is increasing all the time.” This is the view from Dr Frederik King, manager of the cleaning systems branch of the VDMA (German Mechanical and Plant Engineering Association).

The VDMA cleaning systems branch represents over 40 members and is thus well placed to assess current trends and challenges in the cleaning sector.  The key issue in his view at the moment is the digitalisation of the cleaning industry on the basis of driverless cleaning machines.

Market demand for this is evidenced, for example, by the Deutsche Bahn (German Railways) invitation to tender for Berlin’s main railway station. Following a cleaning robot race, during which participating firms had to compete to clean a surface of 200 square metres, one manufacturer was awarded a two-year contract for the delivery and further development of cleaning robots. There are plans to carry out future floor cleaning with cleaning robots in other places too – German Railways is responsible for more than 5,400 railway stations in total.

“Robots do of course require a greater initial investment than traditional machines. However, depending on surfaces and circumstances, this will be recouped over the life cycle of the product. To begin with, the greatest need is for robots which can cope with geometrically simple, large surfaces”, explains King.

Even though cleaning at present takes place mainly at times when there are no members of the general public around, manufacturers are nevertheless committing themselves to compliance with international safety standards to pave the way for interaction with people. When encountering unforeseen obstacles, the cleaning robot must be able to react and find another way.

“There is already a North American standard for these machines. A proposal has already been submitted to an IEC working group for a new work item on developing this standard further at international level”, says Dr King.

Rental and leasing

In addition to safety aspects, further developments relating to automation may in future also be included: the machines are intended at a later date to be able not only to charge themselves automatically but also to empty the waste water and fill up with fresh water and cleaning fluid.

In addition to robotics, further trends point towards the sharing economy and cleaning on demand. “As far as rental/leasing is concerned, we are already noticing a very high  growth rate in our after-sales working group and this is clearly an issue for the future”, declares Dr King.

“Cleaning on demand is being advocated by many manufacturers – an estimate is made, for instance, of the number of people in a particular place, as a basis for determining the specific time to despatch the cleaning robot.”

In Dr King’s view, it is difficult to assess exactly when to expect the use of cleaning robots linked to digitalised working processes to become widespread. “Even with all the advantages that innovations such as this bring with them, it is highly unlikely that entire stocks of machinery are going to be replaced overnight. It will probably take several years before this scenario becomes commonplace.”