Successful test of remote controlled pilot at Herøya

GetUgo, Applied Autonomy and Herøya Industripark AS have carried out the first successful test run of a robot on wheels at Herøya's test area.

four people standing alongside robot on wheels

Success: The test team, from left Tove Sørensen, project manager Herøya Industripark AS, Rebecca Ronke from Applied Autonomy, Matiss Stunda and Janis Upmanis, both from getUgo, are delighted with test runs of the robot on wheels in Herøya Industripark.

The autonomy project DVS TRIP (Driverless pilot Vehicle System for Transport Routing in Industrial Parks) is a Norwegian-Latvian collaboration financed with NOK 1.3 million from Norway.

The test drives kick start the future autonomous pilot services for industrial parks.

Set record

Latvian getUgo have controlled the robot remotely around the test streets at Herøya from a control room in Riga. portrait of man with long hair and beard

"The biggest success for us was that we managed to operate the robot from Riga, 900 kilometers away. This is the longest distance we have remotely controlled a machine so far. It worked well on the 4G network."

Upmanis tells about successful tests on autonomous driving and remote control separately and in combination, execution of several "orders" and safety measures.

An offer to industrial parks

GetUgo has ambitions to offer the service to industrial parks.

"In order to understand if Herøya and others will consider using these solutions, feedback from Herøya Industripark AS is very important to us. The tests give us ideas on what should be improved further."

Welcomes autonomous testing to Herøya

Skjalg Aasland (in yellow jacket in photo below), head of business development and projects at Herøya Industripark AS, welcomes autonomous testing to Herøya.

Visitors to the industrial park are given a demonstration of the pilot — Demonstrating for SAMS Norge: Janis Upmanis (left) from getUgo test team demonstrates the robot for participants from the SAMS cluster Norway (Sustainable Autonomous Mobility System) who visited Herøya Industripark. The industrial park is one of several SAMS test areas in Norway for autonomous mobility.

"Some time ago we created a road map for an autonomous industrial park. Now we see that both the technology and users have become more mature to make transitions to autonomous solutions. Testing of equipment and systems also entails improvement and further development. This is an exciting field that we want to help facilitate," says Skjalg Aasland.

Valuable experience

Tove Sørensen is the project manager of DVS TRIP for Herøya Industripark AS. She also leads Herøya's participation in another large-scale autonomy initiative, the 50 million NOK EU project, Orchestra2020. There, Herøya Industripark AS will test run an autonomous pilot service for freight transport on behalf of the EU. young woman with glasses and blond hair

"We have expanded our knowledge bank in our work to develop Herøya into an autonomous industrial park. The DVS TRIP is not part of the Orchestra project, but is very similar to what we will do in the EU project. So it fits very well. We have gained a lot of valuable experience for similar projects to come."

Expands control platform

Applied Autonomy is testing a new connection, Bring Auto's robot, to their xFlow control platform. young woman with dark long hair tied at back

"We always want to expand the functions of our control platform," says Rebecca Ronke. "The tests worked well, and we have completed what we planned. The goal is that the control system can be interesting for Herøya Industripark and others. Our demonstration verifies that an autonomous robot can be controlled by our control center and used in this context.

Applied Autonomy delivers a control system that among other things, shows real-time data, positions, status of the machine, retrieves data and creates statistics and analyses.

Creates interest

DVS TRIP test drives create interest from many.

a crowd standing outdoors observing the robot on wheels — People came to see the DVS TRIP, and followed the test runs with great interest. Here participants at a professional lunch in Herøya Research Park were given a demonstration of the robot last week.

two men shaking hands over robot — Karsten Rabe, manager at SINTEF TelTek, thanking the test team.

four people standing at the far end of the robot — After two weeks of test runs, the test team packs up the equipment at Herøya.

The project

The project “Driverless pilot vehicle system for transport routing in industrial parks” (DVS-TRIP) receives Norway Grants funding in the amount of 129 999.98 EUR. The aim of this project is to create a new technology - an unmanned “follow me” car system - to route incoming transport into industrial parks. Applied Autonomy will deliver the control system for the operations through the xFlow platform.

Click here to read more on the specifics of the project.