Dr. Michael Zillich

CTO, CMSE

During my master's studies in mechatronics at Johannes Kepler University in Linz, I was already interested in systems in their entirety. In my doctoral studies in the Vision for Robotics group at the Automation and Control Institute at TU Wien, I worked on machine vision in the area of assistive robots. This also required looking at the complete robot, from recognizing objects to navigation and safe grasping.

In particular, the close interaction between assistive robots and humans requires a thorough consideration of safety aspects. This eventually led to the founding of Blue Danube Robotics, where we explicitly work on the safety of robots in general.

My role in the company is to drive the development of our technologies, which, however, should never be done in isolation without taking applications into account. Also, when planning modern and open production layouts, one always has to consider the application in its entirety to achieve optimal productivity while maintaining the highest standards of safety.

The training to become a certified machinery safety expert gave me a comprehensive view of all aspects required for an application's successful implementation.

The Pilz CMSE certification for more and more BDR employees further strengthens our expertise in implementing fenceless, open and flexible automation.