Sepro Robotique’s CEO Jean-Michel Renaudeau made an entire room of the media sit straight-backed upon revealing the French robotics giant would be unveiling “the next big thing” at NPE2015 “for good reason”.
Sepro chose NPE2015 – the largest plastics and rubber showcase in North America – as the platform to launch its three new S7 7X and Strong Line of robots thanks to two years of record sales in the US.
“We are going to disclose our new products here at NPE for very good reason,” said Renaudeau. We are growing here and we are paying special attention to market share… We are going to market with three new lines.”
The next big thing: revealed
Sepro
New at NPE2015: Sepro's 7X Line
On show at Sepro’s booth are three new lines of robots for injection moulding machines with clamping forces between 700 and 5000 tonnes. The new large robots improve upon the Sepro Generation 4 Line, which previously covered high-tonnage moulding applications. In general, the new S7 Line 3-axis robots and 7X Line 5-axis robots have longer kick (Y-axis) stokes, longer vertical (Z-axis) strokes and can handle larger payloads than their G4 predecessors. The Strong Line is a range of universal robots that make the speed and precision of full-servo actuation available to molders who have applications that require simple pick-and-place functionality and simple downstream operations.
In the Sepro booth, the new robots will be represented by a 5-axis 7X45 model, which
combines the same 3-axis platform as the S7 robots with a 2-axis servo-driven wrist developed in partnership with Stäubli Robotics. Unlike pneumatic wrists, which can only move to set positions at 0° and 90° or 0° and 180°, the 7X wrists can move from 0 to 180° and 0 to 270° or anywhere within that range with absolute precision.
Injection moulders are choosing 5-axis robots, because the servo wrist gives them accuracy and flexibility to handle technically demanding parts, with lower tooling costs, less maintenance, cleaner operation and faster mould changes.
Renaudeau explained that this wider offering is true to Sepro’s tagline “your choice in robots”.
“Clearly, we offer more choice for our customers. At the end of 2015 we will have updated our entire portfolio.”
Record-breaking success
Last year was a record-breaker for Sepro, revealed Renaudeau, both for the Group and for Sepro America, which recorded €79.2 million (£58.2 million) in global sales. Sepro America, which provides automation sales, engineering and service throughout the US and Canada, and also supports sister divisions in Mexico and South America, is Sepro’s largest regional market. It saw 2014 sales jump 26 per cent compared to 2013.
Jim Healy, Vice-President of Sales and Marketing, acknowledged the plastics industry overall has been bullish since 2011.
“The automotive industry has been particularly dynamic and, with Sepro’s traditional strength in big robots, that means business for us. However, the growth has really been more broad-based than that. We’ve seen continued strength in medical and packaging segments in the US west and southeast. And we’ve been growing market share, especially in smaller robots,” he remarked.
An additional factor has been Sepro’s growing portfolio of products. In the last three years, the company has completed a full makeover of its production line and introduced five brand new robot ranges, including 5-axis Cartesian robots, 6-axis articulated-arm robots and more.
“We like to talk about offering our customers ‘Your Free Choice in Robots,’” Healy stated. “What we mean by this is that no matter what the application, no matter where you are in the world, regardless of the brand of moulding machines you run, or whether you are automating a new machine or an existing one, Sepro has a solution to your needs. Having one of the broadest product offerings in the industry is definitely an advantage and we see it paying off.”
19 new robots
Besides the 7X45 robot, which is shown arranging giant building blocks with the help of a 6X160L articulated-arm unit, the full range of Sepro choices is on display at NPE. Elsewhere in the booth, a smaller 6-axis robot, a 6X90L, is operating with two 5-axis Cartesian robots in an “iPad relay,” and the “Universal” Success 22 and Success 33 robots are shown with a 5DA 11 dual-arm robot manipulating various auto parts. An S3 servo sprue picker and an SR55 pneumatic picker complete the line-up of 10 robots in the Sepro booth.
A total of nine other Sepro robots can also be seen in operation in the exhibits of injection-moulding machine manufacturers including:
- Sumitomo Demag – Booth W623
- Absolute Haitian – Booth W3683
- G. Pernoud North America (with Billion) – Booth W983
- Stork – Booth W929
- Maruka U.S.A./Toyo – Booth W303
- One other
