Pilz GmbH & Co. KG was founded by Hermann Pilz in 1948 in Esslingen as a glass blowing workshop. In the next decades it switched to the field of electronic equipment, where it spearheaded the development of industry standards in the safety industry. In 1987 the company developed and patented the first safety relay PNOZ, which was able to protect the machine and the operator. Today the next generations of the successful PNOZ line are still the industry safety standard for machines. To remain successful in the digital world, also the IP protection of the digital safety solutions has to be considered like it was for the first PNOZ in 1987. This was the topic of the training by Prof. Wurzer, CEIPI.

One scenario, where safety solutions are of the highest importance in modern factories, are applications, where humans and machines are operating closely together and humans are in danger to be harmed by machines. Here, modern safety lasers can be used to monitor safety zones and automatically stop machines from operating, when humans are entering the danger zones. In the video below, the operating of such a laser safety system is shown for a conveyor belt. A robot arm is picking up components transported on the conveyor belt and transporting them to the next area, when a worker is entering the operation zone. This is an extremely dangerous situation for the worker and the safety system must shut down the robot immediately to avoid any harm.

 

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The training on IP protection of digital solutions is based on the university lectures taught at CEIPI, University of Strasbourg. Especially for the needs of SMEs in digitally transforming manufacturing industries, the University Certificate course on IP and Industry 4.0 was created, which can be taken in full distance learning. Please find more information on the course pages:

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