May 2016
26
I
ndustrial
C
omputing
Unmanned robot controlled by an
COM Express-based rugged handheld
By Norbert Hauser,
Kontron
In critical environments,
military and civilian task forces often
use unmanned robots to scout
the terrain and eliminate hot spots.
Roboteam has developed the ROCU-7,
an intelligent controller that easily
does its job under even the toughest
conditions, for these mission scenarios.
Kontron’s COM Express mini module
is a key element in this solution.
The specialists in the successful US televi-
sion series The A-Team were the inspiration
when Yosi Wolf and Elad Levy founded their
company, Roboteam, in Israel in 2010. Their
plan was to develop a specialized task force
of unmanned robots in order to support sol-
diers in the field, and also to simplify the work
of governments and civil defence authori-
ties. But in this case, it is an A-Team made of
electronics and iron. Today the company has
35 employees at its headquarters in Tel Aviv
and a 10-member team in Maryland in the
USA. As former members of a special unit in
the Israeli army, the company founders were
familiar with all the requirements that mil-
itary operations demand when critical dan-
gers have to be defused. Their objective was to
develop modern unmanned systems that are
easy to operate no matter how difficult the set-
ting and that protect the lives of soldiers and
members of the emergency services.
Today Roboteam develops and produces a
variety of highly specific unmanned plat-
forms and control units that can be used for
defence, law enforcement or security missions.
The robot solutions of the Israeli company are
used for tactical military missions as well as
for handling explosives or chemical, biologi-
cal, radioactive or other hazardous substances.
However the unmanned devices are also used
to investigate tunnels and underground envi-
ronments, as well as for search and rescue.
Dozens of experienced engineers are steadily
at work to develop unmanned systems that
are as light as possible and rapidly available
and that offer users a broad range of functions
for different uses. Customers include the US
military and the Israeli army, as well as gov-
ernments, special military units from various
countries, and SWAT teams and elite units all
over the world.
Based on their own military experience and
intensive talks with users, the company found-
ers set clear priorities for the development of
unmanned systems right from the start. The
solutions that Roboteam offers should be
compact and light-weight, as well as easy to
operate. In addition, the application areas for
unmanned robots also demand 3D representa-
tion, video communication and the necessary
ruggedness for hard use in the field. Compli-
ance with military standards is mandatory.
From the very beginning, the development
teams stressed the importance of an ergo-
nomic product design and human-machine
interfaces that conform to industrial standards.
It should be possible to integrate the control
units for the robots into any networks with
different nodes. For its customers, Roboteam
also stands for short production times, quick
upgrades and good support. These quality
standards that the manufacturer sets are also a
challenge for its suppliers. Around three years
ago, the developer teamwas looking for a small,
flexible CPU that could easily be integrated
into the new ROCU-7 control unit. After a
short market analysis, they found what they
were looking for at Kontron. This company
developed the COM Express mini module in
order to implement power-saving comput-
er-on-modules with greater x86 performance
on a credit card-sized footprint (55 x 84 mm).
The ultra-compact module with COM Express
pin-out type 10 satisfied all the requirements
with regard to functionality and performance
that Roboteam expected from an ultra-small
embedded solution for the ROCU-7 control
unit. In addition, the price-performance ratio
and global customer support at Kontron fit the
bill. Kontron COM Express makes a signifi-
cant contribution to the flexibility and broadly
diversified deployment scenario of ROCU-
7, because it supports widespread commer-
cial standards and also industrial standards.
This makes it possible to use the controller in
this especially critical setting. As a result, the
systems keep working even when subjected
to extreme temperature fluctuations and
challenging environmental conditions such
as extreme weather, severe dust formation or
almost impassable terrain. The name ROCU-7
stands for Ruggedized Operator Control Unit
and classifies a handheld with a 7-inch mon-
itor. Roboteam also offers a version with a
Figure 1. ROCU-7 (Ruggedized
Operator Control Unit)is a
handheld with a 7-inch monitor.
An operator can control various
unmanned systems with just
one of the rugged handhelds, no
matter whether the device is a
terrestrial robot, an unmanned
aerial vehicle (drone) or a sys-
tem for use in water.
