OMRON Corporation of Japan has signed an agreement to invest in Techman to hold an approximately 10% stake in the Taoyuan, Taiwan-based collaborative robot maker.

The capital injection is to beef up the two companies’ joint-efforts to address rapidly growing industrial robot market, as industrial factory production processes are increasingly automated, interconnected and robotized in what’s called as ‘smart factory platform’

The two companies have been cooperating to carve out niches in the growing collaborative robot market since 2018 when Omron signed a strategic alliance with the Taiwanese robotics maker to jointly market and sell TM series of robots using Omron’s marketing channels.

Techman is the world’s second-largest producer of collaborative robots that work with people at manufacturing sites.

Collaborative robot market has been booming in recent years for several reasons. For one thing, there has been strong demand to replace, or complement human workforce with robots not only to tackle labor shortage and industrial disaster issues, but also boost productivity.  

Adding to these factors is the wide and rapid spread of Covid-19 pandemic, which prompts factories to deploy more of collaborative robots on factory floor spaces get them and humans to work together side by side – a move to reduce possible human infections.  

OMRON’s engagement into robot market went back to 2015 when the company acquired industrial robot maker Adept Technology Co., Ltd.

Since then, OMRON has pursued advanced manufacturing with the unique value-generation concept ‘innovative-Automation’ to resolve issues that manufacturing sites face. In 2918, Omron took one step further, allying with Techman to add the Taiwanese company’s collaborative robots to its product lineup.

Under the alliance in work, OMRON and Techman have been jointly developing innovative robot solutions that combine OMRON factory automation equipment with Techman’s collaborative robots, ensuring both safety and productivity.