FORVIA has increased its logistics efficiency, strengthened the stability of its production processes and reduced safety risks with its fleet of MiR robots. The amortization period for the 14 robots at the Faurecia Clean Mobility plant in Písek (Czech Republic) was less than two years.

Currently, 14 MiR robots are installed in Písek. Seven of them, mainly heavy MiR600s, work in the finished goods area, delivering empty pallets to the assembly lines and collecting full pallets for the logistics area. The second area in which the MiR250 robots operate is the delivery of components from the warehouse to the assembly lines. The factory robots are used 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, in three shifts.

Before automation began, shop logistics relied primarily on manual processes, forklifts and stacking equipment. Due to the high risk of occupational accidents and diseases, the company decided to automate the heaviest and least safe processes. The main objective was to introduce technology that would increase both the level of safety and efficiency.

“One of the main challenges of the project was to set up a flexible logistics environment able to adapt to the ever-changing needs of our production hall,” said Martin Horáček, Supply Chain Operations Manager at Faurecia Clean Mobility Europe. “The environment of our production hall is extremely lively and changing, various logistics equipment including palletizers, trolleys, forklifts, etc. meet the people who operate the production lines. Autonomous mobile robots proved to be the best answer to the needs of this factory.

The overall benefits of implementing MiR mobile robots cover three main areas. The first is to improve safety by removing forklifts from the production hall. The second is increasing productivity in all areas of the business. Finally, an important financial aspect: at Faurecia Písek, the amortization period for the investment in MiR robots was less than 2 years.

“The mobile robots, working equally on all three shifts, help us introduce more discipline into the production floor and make our processes more stable and reliable. What we appreciate most about them is is their autonomy, which means that they can move freely in the production hall without any additional equipment,” added Martin Horáček.