Interview with Vincent Touquet
| Mr Vincent Touquet is responsible for Business Development in Smart Robot Handling, focusing on logistics (parcel handling, fulfilment) and material handling. He graduated with a Master in Computer Science Engineering from the K.U. Leuven, Belgium, in 2002 and a Master in Artificial Intelligence at the same university, in 2005. After some experience in big banks and utilities around the world, he took on entrepreneurship. He started working for Photoneo in 2016, helping the company’s expansion in Asia with the set-up of an office in Shanghai, while now focussing on smart robot handling. |
| 1. Your company is a leading provider of robotic vision and intelligence. Can you please tell us about the key real-life solutions from PHOTONEO, which help increase the enterprise’s performance and efficiency? Using our award-winning 3d vision, we can put robots to work inside companies by making them aware of their environment. Being expert consultants, we can offer end-to-end solutions, also as a service. We provide high-performance sorters and put-wall solutions, for instance, focusing on complete end-to-end fulfilment solutions, which our customers in logistics worldwide appreciate. 2. Automation of processes is highly sought after, especially in the field of logistics. How can the enterprise achieve increased efficiency and reduced cost at the same time? Because of ever-increasing customer expectations and demand, there is an enormous need for labour in logistics, even more at peak periods (like on Christmas holidays, Singles day or Black Friday), and automation can help cope with this. For example, in e-commerce, some solutions can automate the fulfilment entirely, including order consolidation; however, excluding automatic packing (for the time being). By making processes less labour intensive, they are more efficient, and the cost is reduced simultaneously. Given the increased demand, the impact on labour does not need to be a net absolute negative; it allows companies to do more with the same number of employees and makes them do higher-order instead of sometimes dangerous and repetitive tasks. 3. How would you describe the impact of coronavirus pandemic on industrial automation? Demand-wise, a few years’ progress has been compressed in a few months: more and more people, even the older generations, are getting used to online shopping and having their orders delivered right to their homes. However, companies are struggling to meet this increased demand. Automation helps them increase throughput and get the products to the customers (end customers and businesses) as fast as possible. Therefore, more and more companies are reaping the benefits of robotic automation. 4. What is your opinion on positioning WOF EXPO in the Central and Eastern Europe region? The WOF Expo brings many interested parties together, from this region and beyond. As a global company, we do feel at home in such a setting. Thanks for having us. |
 | Photoneo is a leading provider of robotic vision and intelligence. Based on patented 3D technology, Photoneo has developed the world’s highest resolution and highest accuracy 3D camera, thus unlocking the full potential of powerful, reliable, and fast machine learning and reducing training and deployment time.
By bringing intelligent robots into the field, Photoneo helps companies mainly in the automotive, logistics, e-commerce, food, and medical industry to improve the performance and efficiency of their manufacturing, fulfilment, and assembly processes.
photoneo.com |