HumanTech 1st Robotic Integration Hackathon
From 26 February to 1 March 2024, we celebrated our first Robotic Integration Hackathon at ACCIONA’s Construction, Technology, and Innovation Division’s facilities in Madrid, Spain. Colleagues from different partner organisations involved in our work on Construction Robotics and Human-Robot Collaboration tested and integrated some of the construction technologies we are developing, which we'll use in our pilot projects.
It was the first time we integrated some of the HumanTech technologies developed by our partners over the past few months into single systems. On the one hand, a mobile robotic platform (from Baubot) to help construction workers build walls by handing over bricks. On the other, a robotic arm to fill concrete joints with elastic material (teleportation and autonomous operation by TECNALIA and SINTEF).
"Robots will be an everyday coworker on construction sites, and we are paving the way for them in HumanTech", says Gabor Sziebig, research manager in robotics and automation at SINTEF and leader of our work on construction robotics and human-robot collaboration.
It was truly exciting to see our technologies in action and a great example of how we are building the future of construction.
Big thanks to our colleagues at ACCIONA and Anurag Bansal for welcoming and hosting us, and to Gabor Sziebig and SINTEF for their efforts in organising this key event, which is a really exciting milestone for our project.
Stay tuned to learn more and watch the interviews we conducted with some of our colleagues at the hackathon! Follow our news and social channels (LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube – where you can find the HumanTech Hackathon playlist) and subscribe to our newsletter.
https://humantech-horizon.eu/2024/06/11/humantech-hackathon-gabor-sziebig/
AI and Robotics in Construction workshop returns to the European Robotics Forum
Join us again at the next edition of the European Robotics Forum (ERF) — one of Europe’s most influential events for the robotics and artificial intelligence community. Our workshop, “AI and Robotics in Construction”, which we will hold on 13 March 2024, will bring together leading experts in AI and robotics — from engineers to researchers and business people, as well as end-users and policymakers — from Europe and beyond.
Projects involved: For the second year in a row, we have collaborated with our sister projects, the EU-funded BEEYONDERS and RoBétArmé, founding members of our Tech4EUconstruction cluster, to organise this workshop.
🗓️ Date and time: 13 March 2024, 16:40-18:00 (GMT+1 / CET)
📍 Location: Palacongressi di Rimini, Via della Fiera 23 – 47923 Rimini (Italy) — Borgo
👥 Organisers: Jason Rambach, Dimitrios Giakoumis and Antonio Alonso Cepeda
📩 Registration
Continuing our workshop from last year, we aim to shed light on questions such as the following:
- What are the most important applications for AI and robotics in construction, and what are the main technological challenges that need to be addressed in this scope?
- How can AI and robotics solutions in construction be acceptable to companies and workers in the building sector? What needs to be done in the next years to this end?
- What are some unexpected challenges during implementation after one year of our projects? Are there any user insights we have collected?
In particular, we want to highlight the potential benefits of AI and robotics in achieving automation in construction — based on the research and development activities we are carrying out.
After briefly presenting our three projects, we will address the key aspects of AI and robotics technologies necessary for introducing robotic automation in construction sites. We will mainly focus on sharing advances in robot vision, navigation, control and human-robot interaction (HRI).
In addition, we will share insights from the first end-user evaluation developed in HumanTech and hold a panel discussion on challenges and lessons learned within our projects. To conclude, we will have an interactive feedback round with the workshop attendees.
Agenda
- Min 0-2: Welcome and introduction by the organisers
- Min 3-22: Presentation of HumanTech, BEEYONDERS and RoBétArmé by their coordinators, Dr. Jason Rambach (DFKI), Antonio Alonso Cepeda (ACCIONA) and Dr. Dimitrios Giakoumis (CERTH ITI), respectively
- Min 23-53: Advances in robot vision, navigation, control and HRI towards new robotic solutions in construction:
- Robot vision in RoBétArmé - Prof. Renaud Detry, KU Leuven
- Human-robot interfaces in construction: HumanTech - Dr. Gabor Sziebig, SINTEF
- Robot vision in autonomous machinery: BEEYONDERS - Dra. María Teresa Lázaro, ITAINNOVA
- Min 54-64: Insights from the first user evaluation in HumanTech: Patricia Rosen, BAuA
- Min 65-75: Round table - Lessons learned and challenges from robotic projects in construction:
- Prof. Herman Bruyninckx, KU Leuven
- Dr. Gabor Sziebig, SINTEF
- Dr. Sascha Wischniewski, BAuA
- José Carlos Jiménez-Fernández, Tecnalia
- Alberto Landini, STAM
- Min 75-80: Feedback round with attendees
Join us! Let’s connect, learn, and identify how to accelerate construction robotics and AI innovation.
Register now Check the agenda and speakers details Join the discussion
https://erf2024.eu/programme/session/ai-and-robotics-in-construction/
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Follow our #Tech4EuConstruction hashtag to learn about the joint initiatives we organise with our cluster.
Implenia at KOMMUNALE Congress 2023: Showcasing innovations in construction
On 18 October 2023, our Implenia partners took part in the KOMMUNALE Congress in Nürnberg, Germany, where they presented their research work at HumanTech and showcased some of their technological solutions for the construction sector.
KOMMUNALE is Germany's largest trade fair for public administration and municipal supplies. The meeting place for decision-makers and experts from cities and municipalities to exchange ideas on the latest offers and services regarding digitalisation, IT security, sustainability, energy transition, public space, mobility and much more.
This year, our partners from Implenia, Switzerland’s leading construction and real estate service provider, had a stand where they introduced their work at HumanTech, where they focus on ensuring that our developments benefit construction workers' health and safety and the construction industry in general and support defining the use cases and requirements for our solutions.
They also showcased their technological solutions for construction — some of which we support at HumanTech. In particular, they presented a new service for innovative infrastructure maintenance, using drones and other smart technologies as well as software to increase efficiency and reduce environmental impact and costs.
Attendees showed a lot of interest in their research, especially their drone pilot, and appreciated the value it can bring, for example, by reducing manual labour for inspections and saving time in construction processes.
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Human Factors in Construction Robotics: Special Session on the 19th IEEE ARSO Conference
We are glad to participate in the 19th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Robotics and Its Social Impacts (ARSO 2023) with a session on "Human Factors in Construction Robotics", where we will demonstrate highlights of our ongoing research activities.
🗓️ Date and time: 6 June 2023, 14:15 - 15:15 (GMT+1 / CET)
📍 Location: Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA), Nöldnerstraße 40-42, 10317 Berlin, Germany
Human Factors in Construction Robotics
In recent years, the use of robots on construction sites is gaining wider acceptance and becoming more widespread.
We invite you to learn about the recent advances in construction robotics with a special focus on human factors, as well as our ongoing research activities on human-robot collaboration and the use of exoskeletons in this special session, where our partners from DFKI, SINTEF, BAuA, STAM, and TECNALIA will be present.
The topics we will discuss include (but are not limited to):
- Construction robotics
- Teleoperation
- Simulation of construction processes
- Human-robot collaboration
- Planning of construction processes
- Evaluation of interaction
HumanTech's Project Coordinator Jason Rambach, a Senior Researcher and Team Leader in Spatial Sensing and Machine Perception at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), and our partner Gabor Sziebig, Research Manager at SINTEF, are organising this session together with Mihoko Niitsuma, Professor at Chuo University.
Apart from Jason, our colleague Patricia Rosen, Research Scientist at the Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA) will make the presentations:
- Serena Ivaldi – Teleoperating a robot for removing asbestos tiles on roofs: Insights from a pilot study
- Jason Rambach – Machine perception for human-robot handover scenarios in construction
- Patricia Helen Rosen – Design recommendations for construction robots – a human-centred perspective
- Dimitrios Giakoumis – Designing human-robot interaction interfaces for shotcrete construction robots; the RobetArme project case
Join us!
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We celebrate our 2nd Executive Board Meeting
At the beginning of April 2023, we held our second Executive Board Meeting in Barcelona, Spain. Two intense days to connect in person, collaborate and share our latest progress, as well as align our goals, priorities and next steps to continue creating innovative technologies for a safer, greener and more efficient European construction industry.
The meeting was attended by representatives of our 22 partner organisations from 10 countries, including Germany, Japan, and Greece.
During the meeting, we discussed the progress made over the past seven months and our plans for the project's next phase. From workshops to technical sessions on the cutting-edge construction technologies we are developing — we covered key topics, including project timelines, important milestones, main priorities and following actions. A productive and successful meeting excellently hosted by our partners at Naska.AI.
This meeting has allowed our HumanTech team to strengthen ties and renew energies to take on our project's next phase, focused on continuing our work to develop human-centred groundbreaking technologies that can help reduce the construction industry's carbon footprint and accelerate the transition to a more digitalised — hence safer and more efficient — world.
Want to keep up to date with our next advancements?
AI and Robotics in Construction: HumanTech's first workshop at the ERF 2023
We have held our first workshop at the European Robotics Forum 2023, the most influential meeting of the robotics community in Europe, initiative of euRobotics. Colleagues from seven partner organisations travelled to Odense, Denmark, to participate in our workshop 'AI and Robotics in Construction', which we organised with our sister projects BEEYONDERS and RoBétArmé, and share their vision on the impact innovation, digitalisation, artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics can have on the building sector.
Present and future of AI and robotics in construction
The workshop started with a presentation on the insights on the European Commission's aims in the scope of AI and robotics in construction by Dimitrios Biliouris, Project Adviser at the European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA).
Afterwards, our project coordinator, Jason Rambach, and the ones of our sister projects, Dimitrios Giakoumis and Antonio Alonso Cepeda, shared the ambitions of the three projects, part of the European Commission's Horizon Europe programme. In addition, they discussed the potential benefits of AI and robotics for achieving automation in construction, based on the technological advances and research activities we are carrying out to accelerate the digitalisation of the industry.
In his intervention, Jason explained the human-centred technologies we are developing — from robotic devices to wearables and dynamic semantic digital twins — to enable a safer, greener, more efficient, rewarding and digital work environment for a new generation of highly skilled construction workers and engineers.
Our colleagues Fernando Sigchos (European Builders Confederation) and Patrick Roth (Implenia), together with Jonas Bentzen (Christiansen & Essenbæk A/S), examined the potential opportunities and challenges of incorporating AI and robotics into construction sites from the end users' point of view.
Finally, Bharath Sankaran (Naska.AI), Gabor Sziebig (SINTEF), Jose Carlos Jiménez Fernández (Tecnalia), Mads Essenbæk (Christiansen & Essenbæk A/S) and Antidio Viguria Jiménez (FADA CATEC) had an insightful panel discussion on the added value of robots and AI on construction projects and feedback round with the attendees.
The session was a great success, with around 100 attendees filling the room. Researchers, engineers, innovators, entrepreneurs, industry leaders, public officials and professionals from all over Europe had the opportunity to explore how public, industrial, and scientific organisations are collaborating to create a better European building industry through innovation in robotics and AI.
and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter to stay up to date with our upcoming workshops and events!
Follow our hashtag #Tech4EuConstruction to learn about the next joint initiatives we organise with our sister projects.
Want to be part of our journey and explore collaboration opportunities with us? We’re all ears.
*Have a look at more images from our workshop and the European Robotics Forum 2023 below.
AI and Robotics in Construction: Workshop at the European Robotics Forum 2023
At HumanTech, we are organising a workshop during the European Robotics Forum 2023 on AI and Robotics in Construction.
🗓️ Date and time: 15 March 2023, 11:05-12:25 (GMT+1 / CET)
📍 Location: Odeons Kvarter 1, 5000 Odense C - Odense, Denmark
We are delighted to invite you to the AI and Robotics in Construction workshop we have organised with our sister projects BEEYONDERS and RoBétArmé, also part of the European Commission's Horizon Europe programme, during the European Robotics Forum 2023 (ERF2023) — the most influential event of the robotics community in Europe.
The workshop will take place on 15 March from 11:05 until 12:25 in Odense, Denmark.
We aim to debate the following key aspects:
- What are the most critical applications for AI and robotics in construction, and which are the main technological challenges that need to be addressed in this scope?
- What are the essential benefits of AI and robotics in construction? Is the future full robotic automation or human-robot collaboration?
- How can construction companies and workers take advantage of the solutions offered by these technologies, and what concrete steps do they need to take in the coming years to do so?
We will discuss the potential benefits of AI and robotics for achieving automation in construction based on the research and development activities we are carrying out at HumanTech, RoBétArmé, and BEEYONDERS. After briefly presenting our three projects, we will address key aspects of this topic: from the benefits and challenges of integrating these technologies into construction sites to their impact on efficiency, waste and emissions reduction and increased safety in the sector.
In addition, partners from industrial projects will share lessons learned and best practices, focusing on the end-users view of AI and robotics in construction. Finally, there will be a panel discussion and feedback rounds with the attendees, where we will delve deeper into the key questions of the workshop.
We will be joined by:
- Dr. Dimitrios Biliouris, Project Adviser, European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA)
- Dr. Dimitrios Giakoumis, RoBétArmé project Coordinator
- Dr. Jason Rambach, HumanTech project Coordinator
- Antonio Alonso Cepeda, Beeyonders project Coordinator
- Jonas Bentzen and Mads Essenbaek, Project Manager and Leader, respectively, Christiansen & Essenbæk A/S
- Fernando Sigchos Jiménez, Secretary General, European Builders Confederation
- Patrick Roth, New Business and Innovation Manager, Implenia
- Dr. Bharath Sankaran, CTO & Co-founder, Naska.AI
- Dr. Gabor Sziebig, Research Manager, SINTEF
- Mr. José Carlos Jiménez Fernández, Civil Engineer, Tecnalia
- Dr. Francisco Javier Pérez Grau, Head of Perception and AI, FADA CATEC
Join us!
Register nowDownload the full agendaJoin the discussion
*Update: Find out how the workshop went in this article!
Researchers from RPTU win the Best Paper Award at EC³
Our partners from the University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU) Fabian Kaufmann, Christian Glock, and Thomas Tschickardt received the Best Paper Award at the 2022 European Council on Computing in Construction (EC³) for their publication on ScaleBIM.
The EC³ is a society of construction professionals, academics, researchers and national Professional Bodies aspiring to become the leading European forum in the area of information technology in construction engineering and management.
Fabian Kaufmann presented the paper "ScaleBIM: Introducing a scalable modular framework to transfer point clouds into semantically rich building information models", an important contribution to the generation of BIMs of existing structures. Thomas Tschickardt presented his contribution, "Lean and BIM based flight planning for automated data acquisition of bridge structures with LiDAR UAV during construction phase", and Christian Glock was Co-author of both publications.
See Fabian Kaufmann's outstanding presentation at EC³ in Rhodes, Greece:
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DFKI augmented vision researchers win 2 awards in the Object Pose Estimation challenge (BOP Challenge, ECCV 2022)
HumanTech's Project Coordinator Jason Rambach and Yongzhi Su and Praveen Nathan, scientists at our partner organisation DFKI Augmented Vision Research Unit, have received the first prize in the prestigious BOP Challenge 2022.
In particular, they have won two awards for their Object Pose Estimation method, ZebraPose, in the categories of Overall Best Segmentation Method and Best BlenderProc-Trained Segmentation Method.
The BOP Benchmark and Challenge addresses the problem of the 6-degree-of-freedom object pose estimation, which is crucial for many applications, such as robot grasping or augmented reality.
This year, the BOP competition was held in the "Recovering 6D Object Pose" workshop at the European Computer Vision Conference (ECCV) in Tel Aviv, Israel.
The winning method was based on the CVPR 2022 paper "ZebraPose". It was developed by a team led by DFKI AV, with the collaboration of researchers from the Technical University of Munich and Zhejiang University.
A total prize of $4000 was distributed among the winning teams of the challenge, donated by Meta Reality Labs and Niantic. The awards were received by HumanTech's Project Coordinator Dr Jason Rambach, who is also a Senior Researcher and Team Leader in Spatial Sensing and Machine Perception at DFKI, on behalf of the DFKI team, who also gave a brief presentation of the method.
Congratulations to all the professionals involved in this milestone!
We meet in Germany to launch HumanTech!
Our HumanTech team gathered in Kaiserslautern (Germany) to kick off this ambitious new project in a two-day hybrid meeting. Representatives from the twenty-two organizations working on this initiative — led by the Augmented Vision Department of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) — could get to know each other and learn more about the work we will be doing over the next three years.
About HumanTech
Our goal is to address the most critical challenges faced by the European construction industry today — making it safer, greener and more efficient.
How? By developing . Solutions such as wearables for worker safety and support and intelligent robotic devices that can co-exist with human workers while contributing to the green transition of the industry.
brings together entities from leading research institutes and universities to innovative SMEs and large companies, present in ten countries and with expertise in eleven different areas.
Throughout the project, we want to explore possible synergies with other initiatives, organizations and experts to support the advancements of HumanTech and create a better construction industry. So, if you are interested in collaborating, !
Learn more about HumanTech in our and keep up to date with our progress by following us on social media (LinkedIn and Twitter) and .