Robotics for the Benefit of Footwear Industry

This paper presents the initial results achieved by the ROBOFOOT project aimed at contributing to the introduction of robotics in the Footwear Manufacturing Industry. In particular, user requirements, operations selected and technical achievements reached so far are described. Visual servoing solution developed for shoe pose identification is described with deeper detail. The introduction of this technology allows the coexistence of current working practices and robotic solutions, with minor changes in the production means already existing in most companies. This has been identified as one of the requirements by the end-users taking part in the project.