Industry Startups / IndustrialTech-Startups – young companies in Industry 4.0
In today’s article of our Startup Industries series, we would like to dedicate ourselves to the broad field of IndustrialTech startups. We explain what IndustrialTech means, give an overview of the development of the industry in recent years and the most relevant trends and technologies being developed by startups in this field. We also present three particularly successful IndustrialTech startups, as well as the cooperation example of the startup Wandelbots and their partner Volkswagen.
As one of the largest sectors worldwide, industry covers a very broad field. It includes areas such as mechanical engineering and energy as well as classic industrial sectors such as production, mining and utilities. With Industry 4.0, digitization has now also arrived in the industrial sector. Digital and innovative technologies are needed to make work processes more efficient and also more sustainable. This is referred to as IndustrialTech. The term thus refers to digital technologies in the industrial sector. Startups can offer some added value here with their innovative ideas.
The development of IndustrialTech
Due to increasingly strong demand, the IndustrialTech industry has developed rapidly in recent years. For example, global VC investments increased fourteenfold between 2013 and 2018. The logistics sub-sector is at the forefront of digitization in industry. Here, innovative solutions are already being successfully implemented and can offer plenty of benefits. In the highly fragmented logistics industry, freight forwarding, warehouse automation and e-commerce logistics are among the sectors in which the most investments have been made. In this context, warehousing is the most automated area, where many IndustrialTech startups are using robotics. The trend towards digitalization and innovative technologies can be observed throughout the industry, both in Europe-wide and globally. In the European region, however, Germany and France in particular have been able to establish themselves as centers for IndustrialTech startups in recent years.
The innovative solutions offered by IndustrialTech startups have plenty of benefits to offer the industry. They help drive the digitization of the industry. This means more efficiency, and less costs. There can also be some added value here in terms of sustainability. Startups therefore contribute not only to increasing production, but also to the growth of the entire industry through efficiency and cost reduction.
One of the most relevant current technologies is predictive maintenance. This refers to a maintenance process that is based on the evaluation of process and machine data. These are monitored in real time based on IoT. This allows forecasts to be made, faulty production to be avoided, the need for maintenance work to be predicted, and costs to be saved. This is also beneficial from a sustainability perspective, as predictive maintenance support results in less scrap. Equipment can be checked either offline periodically or online permanently. Overall, production is made more sustainable and efficient through the use of predictive maintenance.
Another trend is the topic of retrofitting. Large industrial plants often have to be adapted to the latest technical standards and digitized. Here, old, already existing structures and analog machines are digitized. Retrofitting is used in particular in special machinery and plant engineering. A distinction is made between brownfield and greenfield plants. While greenfield plants require new industrial plants to undergo a time-consuming certification process, brownfield plants use retrofitting to make existing structures fit for Industry 4.0. Big data also plays a major role in the field of industrial technology. This refers to the processing of very large volumes of data based on the Internet of things. Here, the larger the database and the more sophisticated the algorithm, the more reliable the result.
IndustrialTech startup case study: Iox Lab
The startup IoX-Lab was founded in 2015 by Andreas Bell and CEO Robert Jänisch in Düsseldorf. They are active in the fields of industrial design, electrical engineering, software and hardware development and UX design.Meanwhile, more than 130 IoT projects have already been implemented by Iox. For this, the startup works with IoT sensors and a platform-as-a-service model. Iox-Lab’s solutions are successfully used in industries such as transport & logistics, retail, energy & environment, and administration & defense. In 2017, the startup won the Gründerpreis NRW for its innovative technologies. The young company can now count renowned companies such as Unilever, Baiersdorf, Henkel, Daimler and Vodafone among its partners.
IndustrialTech startup case study: Proglove
Another exciting case study of an IndustrialTech startup is the Munich-based startup Proglove. It has developed a smart glove that is intended to make work in factories easier. The glove contains scanners and sensors that detect when certain work steps are not being carried out correctly. If this is the case, a warning signal is sent to the employee performing the work. In this way, incorrect and unnecessary work steps can be avoided and unnecessary costs reduced. Overall, the entire work process is mapped more efficiently. The technology is successful: the startup’s partners already include major industrial groups such as Bosch, Kuka and BMW.
IndustrialTech startup case study: BAM GmbH
BAM GmbH has also been able to take off in the IndustrialTech sector since its founding in 2015. The startup was founded in 2011 in the Upper Palatinate and offers special machine construction, precision manufacturing and digital services. With these, it is possible to have components delivered faster, as well as to create automatic price calculations and quotations. The startup’s customers include, for example the german Telekom. In 2019, its own online portal Mipart was launched. With this on-demand manufacturing platform, BAM 2020 won the YoungTech Enterprise Startup Pitches, which took place as part of the Hannover Messe Digital Days. You can find all the startup pitches of the YoungTech Enterprises participants on our blog. Here you can access the first part of the pitches, here you can find the second part.
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Cooperation use case Wandelbots Dresden
A successful cooperation example of an IndustrialTech startup, which we would like to present here, is the cooperation between Wandelbots and Vokswagen in the Transparent Factory in Dresden. The startup Wandelbots was founded in 2017 by scientific employees of the TU Dresden with the goal of democratizing robot programming. In doing so, the team focused on industrial robots. The startup developed a solution to execute movements that can be imitated and learned by the robot. In this way, they can be programmed easily and even by people who are not experts in the field. With this idea, Wandelbots virtually revolutionized the robotics industry. They were already able to present their solution at the Hanover Fair, and have continued to improve it over the years.
While the number of employees has grown from six to ninety in recent years, the startup’s headquarters are still located in Dresden. However, the young company’s customers are spread all over the world, across Europe, Asia and America. Wandelbots can count some large corporations among its customers, but also cooperates with SMEs. This is because the startup’s user-friendly solution meets the demand for digitization in SMEs in particular, and is also easy to implement.
Usually, the programming of robots involves a lot of time. In addition, a certain amount of expertise and know-how is required. The Wandelbots solution makes this process much easier. Using smart clothing, the body movements of a human can be detected and transferred to the robot. In the background, the software learns this process and creates a program that is executed by the robot. Robot programming thus takes place in three defined steps: teach, refine, execute. It can be applied in industrial production for manufacturing steps such as welding, gluing, spraying or grinding, among others. By solving Wandelbots, robot programming can be implemented up to 70 times faster and 90% cheaper. In addition, programming no longer requires expert knowledge and can be performed by non-specialist employees.
The Wandelbots technology is already being used by Volkswagen, among others, in its transparent factory in Dresden. This site, where the electric Golf is produced, among other things, is entirely focused on the future of mobility. Innovative technologies such as autonomous driving and electric mobility are being worked on here. In other words, the vehicles of the future are to become smarter and more sustainable. To promote this, Volkswagen operates the Future Mobility Campus student lab and a startup incubator there, among other things. In addition, the Transparent Factory is geared towards communicating Volkswagen’s vision of the future and offers public tours for visitors as part of this.
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Wandelbots was able to win Volkswagen as a cooperation partner shortly after its founding. The car manufacturer has precisely the need that the startup’s solution covers: rapid automation of processes and work steps so that production becomes as profitable as possible. This is normally difficult according to the current state of the art, but possible with Wandelbots’ innovative solution. Specifically, they are working, for example, on using human-robot collaboration to install speakers in car doors. The collaboration offers a great win-win for both sides. While Volkswagen benefits from the startup’s technology, Wandelbots can learn from the company’s expertise and experience. This way, they can keep improving their solution. In an interview with Ambivation, Wandelbots CEO Christian Pienicke talks in detail about the collaboration with Volkswagen, and also provides valuable tips for a successful cooperation.
The demand for digitization in industry has grown rapidly in recent years. Accordingly, the IndustrialTech sector has also experienced a strong upswing. But what is the forecast for the future? With the dawn of the digital age and the shift to Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution has only just begun. Due to its agility and innovative power, this offers startups optimal opportunities; they can meet newly emerging needs with their solutions. In the meantime, more and more large industrial groups are cooperating with the young companies. It is therefore to be expected that some more exciting technologies will be developed here and that more and more companies will recognize the potential of IndustrialTech startups. In this way, the industry can continue to grow in the future and create added value for the industrial sector.
About Ambivation
Ambivation connects innovative companies and startups for cooperation and innovation partnerships. As an innovation consultancy and matchmaker, Ambivation promotes cooperation between established companies and startups within the framework of concrete customer, supplier and research partnerships. We support companies in the identification of needs, startup identification, startup evaluation and cooperation initiation with startups. Formats such as research on relevant startups, startup monitoring, strategic cooperation consulting or event formats such as startup tours serve this purpose. Our monthly newsletter also provides information on current examples of cooperation and events.
