ROBOTA-SUDOE focuses on robotics, automation, and digitalisation in order to promote the competitiveness and growth of SMEs.
The ROBOTA-SUDOE project – Robotics, automation, and digitalisation as drivers of competitiveness and growth for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), with the participation of the University of Beira Interior (UBI), was approved in the first SUDOE 2021-2027 call for proposals and has received total funding of around 2 million euros. This work covers the technological modernisation of economic sectors in the SUDOE area, in particular the agri-food and plastics industries, contributing to the transfer of knowledge and innovation to less developed areas and to traditional and artisanal sectors where automation is more difficult. These techniques will be implemented in real production environments, such as meat cutting, doll assembly and the handling and packaging of fruit products, the latter of which is expected to have a significant impact on the region’s agricultural sector.
At UBI, the project is led by Pedro Dinis Gaspar, a professor in the Electromechanical Engineering Department and leader of the Innovation and Technology for Sustainability Laboratory (LITecS), whose aim is to create new technologies to control collaborative robots, applying innovative and differentiated methods to manipulate objects using flexible grippers and new technological solutions to support workers in carrying out repetitive and arduous tasks.