Maxon Precision Motors (Fall River, Mass.) is partnering with National Instruments (Austin, Tex.) in an initiative to highlight mutual areas of interest in the field of robotics. An informal relationship between the two companies was initiated as early as 2006, with the inclusion of NI LabVIEW virtual intstruments in Maxon’s EPOS family of digital position and speed controllers. Most recently, they collaborated on the design and development of ViNI , an all inclusive robotics platform created by engineers at National Instruments. ViNI is driven exclusively by Maxon motors, gearheads and encoders and NI CompactRIO embedded controls.

Both Maxon and National Instruments recognize that advancements in each respective area of expertise are complementary and look to provide designers with state-of-the-art hardware and software solutions for developing new robotic products and applications. Maxon will continue to focus its R&D efforts on electric motors, sensors and motion controllers while National Instruments will leverage its LabVIEW platform, NI LabVIEW, NI SoftMotion Module, and CompactRIO.

Other notable robotic applications driven by Maxon motion control products include the Mars Rover by Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Da Vinci surgical robot by Intuitive Surgical and DARwin the humanoid robot (pictured) developed at RoMeLa, the Robotics & Mechanisms Laboratory at Virginia Tech University.