Formulating User Requirements for Designing Collaborative Robots

This paper is concerned with a methodology for gathering user requirements (URs) to inform a later design process of industrial collaborative robots. The methodology is applied to four use cases from CoLLaboratE, which is a European project focusing on how industrial robots learn to cooperate with human workers in performing new manufacturing tasks. The project follows a User-Centered Design (UCD) approach by involving end-users in the development process. The user requirements are gathered using a mixed methodology, with the purpose of formulating a list of case-specific requirements, which can be also generalized. The results presented in this paper consist of the list of user requirements, which will serve as a basis in establishing scenarios and system requirements for the later design of a Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) system. The described methodology contributes to the field of design of HRC systems by taking a UCD approach. The methodology is aimed at improving the solution performance and users’ acceptance of the technology, by early involvement of the users in the design process. It can also be adaptable to other development projects, where users play an essential role in creating Human-Robot Collaboration solutions.