Advanced robotics is profoundly transforming how people and machines collaborate throughout the supply chain. For a manufacturing company like GEWISS, this transformation involves optimizing every phase: from sourcing raw materials to producing electrical devices, LED lighting systems and home automation solutions, and finally distributing products via both traditional and digital channels.

The main goal is twofold: to improve internal efficiency by enhancing quality and productivity, and to make relationships with suppliers and customers more agile, flexible and personalized.

This revolution is made possible through two innovative technologies:

• Cobot, primarily used during the manufacturing phase.
• Machine customer, which play a key role in the initial and final stages of the supply chain.

Also known as collaborative robots, cobots are one of the most significant innovations in industrial robotics. Unlike traditional robots, designed to operate autonomously and often isolated from human operators for safety reasons, cobots are specifically designed to work side by side with people. This collaborative approach integrates the best of human capabilities, such as creativity and problem-solving, with the precision and durability typical of machines.

In the production phase, one of the primary goals is to ensure that production lines run smoothly, with short cycle times, consistent quality and high adaptability to changing demands. Cobots meet these needs perfectly, offering a unique combination of flexibility and reliability.

Among the key benefits of cobots are:

• Error and defect reduction: continuous collaboration between operators and cobots enhances precision and minimizes the chances of errors.
• Improved working conditions: cobots can handle repetitive, heavy or physically demanding tasks, allowing operators to focus on more strategic or creative activities.
• Operational flexibility: thanks to intuitive interfaces, cobots are easy to program and manage, enabling quick adaptation to new production needs.

Integrating cobots into production lines and their dynamic interaction with human staff not only streamlines and improves the efficiency of production processes but also generates benefits across the entire supply chain. By reducing downtime and enhancing product quality, cobots help optimize costs and improve the company’s competitiveness.

Thanks to their versatility, collaborative robots are redefining the future of industrial production, positioning themselves as an indispensable resource for addressing the challenges of a global and dynamic market.

Machine customers embody a new paradigm in commercial relationships, focusing on interactions between businesses and machines. These intelligent robots are designed to autonomously purchase goods and services, bringing efficiency and rationality to transaction processes.

Unlike traditional B2B or B2C models, machine customers introduce the concept of B2M (business-to-machine), where autonomous machines act as intermediaries or final decision-makers, transforming how organizations manage purchasing and sales processes.

Machine customers can be divided into two main categories

• Sellerbot: these are robots designed to facilitate sales processes on the supply side, as they function as intermediaries that improve the accessibility and speed of business transactions. One of the first examples of sellerbots can be found in Amazon Dash Replenishment, a system launched in 2018 to automate household consumables reordering, which was not particularly successful at the time. Over time, the spread of technologies such as generative artificial intelligence and IoT has made these systems more effective and accessible: today, HP's Instant Ink service allows printers to autonomously manage the reordering of cartridges, offering a convenient experience for consumers and optimizing business processes.
• Custobot: they are smart robots designed to act as rational buyers, meaning they can make logical decisions based on data and predefined strategies. Automatic financial trading systems, which execute orders based on pre-established algorithms, represent an advanced form of custobot. The approach is, however, currently extending to other sectors thanks to the availability of large amounts of data. Custobots analyze offers, negotiate terms and complete transactions autonomously: an innovative example is the Negotiation-as-a-Service (NaaS) service by Pactum AI, which allows companies to delegate repetitive negotiations with suppliers to custobots, improving efficiency and productivity.

The introduction of machine customers, particularly custobots, marks a turning point in purchasing dynamics. Their functioning is based on three fundamental elements:

• Access to data: the more data available, the more precise the decision-making process.
• Operational efficiency: by automating transactions, machine customers reduce the time and costs associated with manual processes.
• Personalization and logic: custobots operate according to a rational approach, eliminating the risk of emotional decisions and ensuring a more accurate evaluation of offers.

Besides a technological choice, integrating cobots and machine customers must be considered a strategy to face the challenges of an increasingly competitive global market. Thanks to these solutions, companies can optimize production, improving quality and reducing timing; make procurement and distribution operations more agile and personalized; and create new business opportunities through innovative models such as B2M (Business to Machine). 

Therefore, it is essential to look to the future with the awareness that the synergy between people, collaborative robots and machine customers is a fundamental pillar for achieving excellence and generating efficiency and value throughout the entire supply chain.È pertanto fondamentale guardare al futuro con la consapevolezza che la sinergia tra persone, robot collaborativi e machine customer rappresenta un pilastro fondamentale per raggiungere l’eccellenza e generare efficienza e valore lungo l’intera catena di fornitura.