InOrbit in 2024: A Year of Partnerships, Interoperability and Multi-Vehicle Orchestration

As the year comes to an end, we wanted to take some time, as we always like to do, and reflect on the past 12 months. 2024 has been a year of breakthrough innovation for robotics, with advancements in artificial intelligence and the growing need for seamless integration between diverse technologies driving significant progress across the industry. At InOrbit, we've been at the forefront of this evolution, focusing on key areas: empowering intelligent robot operations (RobOps) through AI and building deeper, more meaningful connections with partners across the robotics ecosystem.

This focus has led to significant growth for InOrbit, as we now support more varied kinds of automation than ever before. Integrations with supporting technologies—from simulations and maintenance to real-time location tracking—have become integral to our users’ daily workflows. InOrbit has also remained a consistent voice, advocating for collaboration between companies and technologies to push the boundaries of robotics. We’re proud of all that we’ve accomplished in the name of bringing people together and achieving what was once thought impossible through collaboration.

AI: Powering Intelligent Operations

AI has long been a key driver of robot capabilities, powering vision systems, simulations, and navigation. As AI has grown more sophisticated and accessible, particularly with the rise of Large Language Models (LLMs) last year, many robot developers have integrated front-end AI tools for general use. However, even as AI helped make robots smarter, their relationship with the larger ecosystem of technology and operations needed guidance. With increased complexity comes increased challenges. Robots in warehouses, restaurants, retail, agriculture, and more are working alongside humans and other technologies, requiring robust operational assistance.

InOrbit has always used AI to make robot operations better. But in 2024, under the leadership of InOrbit CTO Ramiro Diaz Trepat, we focused on making AI more accessible and useful for everyone working with robots, enhancing operations across industries by bringing a front-end to AI-powered (RobOps. In the Spring of 2024, we launched InOrbit RobOps Copilot to do just that, starting with more accessible data insights that drive optimization. Copilot provides a simple way for anyone to ask questions about their robot data using natural language—no coding or complicated dashboards needed.  For example, users can ask questions like "What was the average uptime of my AMRs last week?" or "Show me all instances of robot X experiencing error Y." This means users can quickly find the answers they need to keep their robot fleets running smoothly, whether they're seasoned robotics engineers or just getting started.

InOrbit RobOps Copilot is much more than an LLM. At InOrbit, we don’t deal in smoke and mirrors; this isn't a fluffy chatbot. InOrbit RobOps Copilot is built with purpose and designed for accessibility. We know questions often arise in real conversations, so we brought the analysis to the users where discussions happen. Teams can invite Copilot to join their Slack conversations and explore robot data across roles to immediately identify opportunities for improvement by accessing the most relevant data. As Ramiro Diaz Trepat explained, "InOrbit is uniquely positioned at the intersection of AI, robotics, and operations...The next phase is about accelerating that value by leveraging AI more effectively." This immediately sets InOrbit RobOps Copilot apart, as it empowers more intelligent operational decisions.

Building on the idea of making data more accessible, we also enhanced InOrbit’s Time Capsule feature with AI-powered visual analysis. This unique vision capability uses the robot's camera data to automatically create summaries of events, identifying potential issues. It’s like having a second set of eyes constantly watching your robots, helping to quickly analyze incidents to understand what went wrong and find solutions faster. This means operations teams spend less time manually reviewing footage and more time focusing on actually fixing problems.

InOrbit RobOps Copilot is now an essential component of InOrbit's AI-powered multi-system orchestration capabilities, enabling optimized coordination across diverse robotic fleets and automation systems.

Expanding the Ecosystem: Powering Seamless Connections

Collaboration has always been central to InOrbit's vision. This philosophy has driven our efforts to build a robust ecosystem of partners and integrations, extending the reach and impact of our platform. In 2024, this commitment reached new heights with the continued expansion of InOrbit Connect, an initiative simplifying the deployment and management of automation by allowing users to connect, control, and monitor robots from multiple vendors, for improved efficiency, lower operational complexity and a truly interconnected robotics landscape. Florian Pestoni, CEO of InOrbit, has consistently emphasized the importance of collaboration in the robotics industry, highlighting the need for diverse technologies to work together seamlessly to achieve complex tasks.

Simulating the Future

At the start of 2024, InOrbit, in collaboration with Ekumen, brought RobOps to simulations through a partnership with NVIDIA, allowing users to test and optimize robot deployments in virtual environments using NVIDIA Isaac Sim. This was further showcased at GTC, where we demonstrated the power of simulation for advanced incident analysis in Time Capsule.

This work highlights the power of simulation in accelerating robot development and deployment. CEO and founder at NVIDIA of Jensen Huang's keynote at GTC outlined a vision for the "software-defined" warehouse of the future. This narrative, with its emphasis on "Physical AI," echoes much of the vision we’ve been sharing for years around connections to the real world through advanced software.

Real-World Impact

Making robots work better in real-world environments has been a core focus for InOrbit in 2024, with partnerships that extend beyond traditional concerns. Our work with WAKU addresses the critical area of robot maintenance, providing valuable insights into robot health and performance. Our strategic partners from Robotic Crew bring the necessary talent to RobOps. Wireless charging through partners like Puls ensures fleet operations keep moving. And integrating Real-Time Location Systems (RTLS), through partnerships with industry leaders like SICK, and Slamcore, has enabled the comprehensive tracking of any vehicle—from robots to forklifts and even personnel—on a single unified InOrbit map. 

This cross-technology integration, layered with capabilities to coordinate traffic across zones, and to create and execute missions has been pioneered by InOrbit. It was just two years ago when we unveiled multi-vendor robot fleets on a single map, showcasing the rapid pace of innovation in the field. Technology partnerships grew as well this year, with our first ASRS integration in InStock, our expanded work with Karcher, and many first-time robots on InOrbit, demonstrating the real-world value of the platform to both robot developers and their customers, enterprises using automation. 

All of this was on display throughout the year, showcased at the InOrbit Robot Space in Mountain View, California. Part community center, part laboratory, part showroom these real-world deployments and partnerships brought to life are part of why industry leaders like Google have chosen to support our work, and top analysts at Gartner have deemed us officially cool. After our first year of (frankly) wild success with the Robot Space, we took stock, celebrated, and expanded, tripling in size to support much more. That meant more room for partners, more demonstration space, and more places for community and industry gatherings. We held far too many events at the InOrbit Robot Space to mention them here, but we effectively tripled the number of demonstrations seen at the space, and just about doubled the number of community events since 2023. Thank you to everyone who joined us this year to realize such incredible success!

A Global Reach

Our commitment to expanding the robotics ecosystem has also led to an exciting partnership with Globant, the industry leader in digital transformation. This collaboration will enable us to bring RobOps to more businesses worldwide, helping them to implement, scale, and manage their robotic deployments more effectively. It represents a significant step in making RobOps integration accessible to a larger audience, solidifying InOrbit as the leader in the space. We were honored to explore the partnership in detail at the recent Converge conference. 

Orchestrating the Future

As should be clear by now, InOrbit's commitment extends beyond simply providing a platform for robot management. We envision a future where robots of all types, from various manufacturers, seamlessly collaborate within a single environment. The motto "We make robots work together," is not just a tagline; it's a driving force behind our ongoing efforts.  

Florian Pestoni, InOrbit's CEO, is a long-standing vocal advocate for interoperability within the robotics industry. His leadership extends beyond InOrbit, as a co-founder of the Robot Operations Group, and active involvement in ISO (International Organization for Standardization) discussions to define robotic interoperability standards. This year he led InOrbit to join the OSRA (Open Source Robotics Alliance) and most recently, the ARii (ARME robotics interoperability Initiative) to further champion collaboration and the development of shared best practices.

We see these efforts are crucial for unlocking the true potential of robotics. By ensuring different robots can communicate and collaborate effectively, we can safely optimize multi-system orchestration in automated and mixed workplaces.

Multi-Vehicle Orchestration in Action

This year, InOrbit has made significant strides in multi-vehicle orchestration. Enabling easy-to-use and tailored tools for the coordination of robots from different vendors, as well as non-robotic vehicles like forklifts and personnel, with existing integrated systems and supporting technologies. As we recently noted, the real world is messy, so much incredible technology has developed so quickly that everyone could use a little help along the way. This is our vision, once maybe just a futuristic dream, but something that is quickly becoming reality thanks to dedication and innovation.  

We are incredibly grateful for the continued support of our partners, developers, and the entire robotics community. Together, we are making the future of collaborative automation a reality.

Stay tuned for an even bigger 2025!