Universal Robots’ UR5e cobot to close NYSE

October 16, 2018 – Universal Robots’ new UR5e collaborative robot has a special job to do on October 17 – ringing the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

The NYSE bell ringing, which is normally reserved as a task for humans, will celebrate the five-year anniversary of ROBO Global, the first-ever robotics, automation and AI index. Launched in October 2013, ROBO invests in more than 80 of the most innovative companies across the globe, spanning 12 subsectors from manufacturing to healthcare to sensing.

The UR5e cobot is able to work alongside people with no safety guarding, giving watchers worldwide the opportunity to see how cobots interact with humans.

Cobots are now the fastest growing segment of industrial automation, expected to jump ten-fold to 34 per cent of all industrial robot sales by 2025, according to the International Federation of Robotics. Universal Robots pioneered the market by selling the first commercially viable cobot in 2008 and now has 60 per cent global share of the cobot market, selling more cobots than all competitors combined. This fall, the company announced the sale of its 25,000th cobot.

“Since acquiring UR in 2015, Teradyne has been a key growth driver in the ROBO Global Index,” says Travis Briggs, CEO of ROBO Global U.S. “We are thrilled that Teradyne has generously agreed to join the ROBO Global team for this one-of-a-kind NYSE bell ringing.”

Representing UR and Teradyne will be Stuart Shepherd, regional sales director of UR’s Americas division. “With this event, we celebrate not just the success of robotics in empowering customers and investors, but also the successes of our customers in innovating and changing their workplace with cobots,” he says. “The bell ringing reflects our continued commitment towards making cobots an easy-to-integrate piece of a company’s operations platform.”