RBC Says You Don't Need a PLC — That's the Claim I Most Want to Test

Buying a collaborative robot and then having to hire an engineer who can write PLC — just hearing that gives me a headache.

The other day I looked through Rainbow Robotics' RBC series. The product line is pretty broad, working range, payload, arm length all selectable, and the official line says the core tech comes from their humanoid robot HUBO. Beyond the specs, the official also mentioned that no external PLC is needed, no extra development either, and you can set up the automation process with their own software. I stared at that line for a long time.

I've been around humanoid robots for about two months, and my biggest takeaway is that hardware is easy to copy, the software stack is not. Collaborative robots are the same story — arm length, payload, these numbers don't differ much between peers, and the length of the deployment cycle basically gets stuck at the programming part.

The other two points in the material are about safety. Built-in collision detection, both internal and external, and it's passed safety certification from global certification bodies, with IP rating claimed to be industry-leading. I don't doubt this part — a collaborative robot has to share a workstation with people, certification is the entry ticket, without it you don't even have the right to talk.

But an entry ticket doesn't equal saving money.

The money saved is all in that software layer that means you don't need to hire a PLC engineer. So my advice is very specific: when evaluating, don't just stare at arm length and payload, first ask whether you can take your own production line's working conditions and run them through its built-in software, especially how long reconfiguration takes when switching product models. I wrote a post before about acceptance criteria, saying tutorials only guarantee consistency with the reference, and you still have to draw the acceptance line yourself — same logic here.

If this step passes, RBC earns a spot on the candidate list. If it doesn't, it's just a pretty arm.