— By Plasteurope.com staff — 

Energy giant Shell (London; www.shell.com) has entered into a long-term strategic agreement with Japanese industrial automation specialist Yokogawa Electric Corporation (Tokyo; www.yokogawa.com) to advance the integration of robotics and artificial-intelligence technologies in plant monitoring and maintenance. In a joint statement, the firms said the collaboration is aimed at streamlining operations, enhancing efficiency, and reducing operational risks in asset-integrity management across industrial sites.

According to the companies, under the agreement, Yokogawa will incorporate Shell’s proprietary machine vision solution, Operator Round by Exception (ORE), into its OpreX robot management core software, expanding its applications in plant operations. ORE, developed through a two-year internal initiative at Shell, uses machine vision and AI analytics to enable autonomous robots to perform routine operator tasks traditionally carried out by humans such as reading gauges, detecting leaks, and inspecting equipment.

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The upgraded system will be piloted at two Shell sites as part of a joint project at the Energy Transition Campus Amsterdam. The partnership also includes a joint research and development roadmap aimed at enhancing the capabilities of machine vision technologies.