Maurizio (00:00)
Good day from London. I’m Maurizio Pilu and I’m the founder and managing director of Safetytech Accelerator. I would like to welcome you to this new episode of our Insights series. The topic of this episode is exoskeletons. So we at Safetytech Accelerator worked on this topic with the National Safety Council in the USA and Amazon. We, in particular around musculoskeletal disorder, MSD.
And as you know, probably many of you listening will know, MSD is a big, big problem in the workplace, and millions of workers are affected globally. And it’s affecting also productivity of businesses, and in fact, all economies. It is so big that it affects economies. We have recently launched a report looking particularly at tech solutions to combat MSD in the workplace.
it benefits, both in terms of health and safety, but also productivity. And clearly exoskeletons are some of the tech solutions that can really solve the MSD problem. But for all the potential and all the investment going on into this sector, we are still really at the very early stages of adoption. And so what’s the state of play? Where are we going?
What are the opportunities and barriers? So today we are speaking to Bobby Marinov. Bobby is the founder of Exoskeleton Report and amongst other things is a podcaster and also Forbes contributor in this area. Bobby, your Exoskeleton Report is becoming a point of reference for this field, so congratulations. In fact, you also…
kindly mentioned us in your forum’s article on this, what was it, a month ago. So thank you very much for that. You mentioned us and also our MSD report. So Bobby, welcome. We are pleasure to have you. And let’s dive into it, shall we?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (01:53)
Pleasure to be here. Yes, absolutely. I loved your report because it showed exoskeleton as an ergonomic solution in context of other emerging solutions, other than looking at it in a vacuum. So great job with that report.
Maurizio (02:08)
Thank you very much. So let’s start with you first. So can you tell us briefly about yourself and your background, like the three minute elevator pitch about Bobby.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (02:19)
Sure, I graduated as bioengineering pre-medicine from UC San Diego some time ago. I come from a family that has been heavily involved with media, medicine, and teaching. My dad has been a robotics engineer his entire life, focusing on motion control. So all of these elements, whether through genetics or exposure, kind of have led me to where I am now.
So nine years ago, I felt that exoskeleton technology is finally getting like really to the point of adoption, where we’re moving away from science fiction into reality. And I’ve always been interested in robotics. I’ve always been interested in the human element of how can we preserve humanity while also getting the benefits.
the endurance reproducibility consistency of a robotic device kind of combined the two of them together, if you would like to say. So nine years ago, I thought like, okay, well, we’re finally here, where the technology has gotten to the point where this is becoming practical. Because we think of exoskeleton technology as something new, but there are pictures and ideas going back 400 years ago.
at the start of using steam power, people were already fantasizing of how can we strap a steam engine onto a person and what would be the disadvantages and advantages of it. And the way I like to think of it is even if you think of humans and humanity, the first invention of cave people was the ability to throw spears at a longer distance.
Maurizio (03:49)
Thank
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (04:05)
by using a stick to propel a spear forward. So it’s adding an additional joint to the human body. And it is believed that that came before actually before the sling. So we as humans have been obsessed with what can we do with our bodies and how we can modify their capabilities.
Maurizio (04:26)
That’s amazing, actually. And I didn’t quite see the launching a sphere as an early form of exoskeleton, but actually, yes, come to think of it. So is that when you launched the exoskeleton report nine years ago, or was it a more recent thing that you have done, Bobby?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (04:45)
It got started nine years ago. Originally, I intended it to be like a platform for people to see where my thoughts are on the industry. Then when I, if I would start my own company and build my own exoskeletons, I would have a starting point. And then I quickly discovered that at least at the time that was really prevalent, the different organisations, labs and companies existed in silos. So,
people didn’t really know that they’re working in parallel on solving some of the same problems. So then I pivoted from, rather than starting yet another exoskeleton company, of which we have 150 of them, I could try to popularize them. So I live in Silicon Valley, which is the land of capital, investment capital for new businesses. And getting investors
Maurizio (05:16)
we talk together.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (05:44)
and engineers excited about this technology here has always been a challenge. So it becomes more of a communication challenge rather than an engineering challenge.
Maurizio (05:58)
That’s very insightful, even if in Silicon Valley this is not a straightforward type of investment. But we will cover that when we dive into the technology. So let’s start, in fact, talking about the technologies. Now, obviously, we move the society as humans quite a long way from the initial slingshots, and spears.
I must confess a few of the exoskeletons are a bit like science fiction, I have to say, when I see them at trade shows and so on. me, it’s like, obviously, I watch too many science fiction movies. But in the real world, Bobby, given your, I guess, unique perspective of the market, are they really becoming a thing now for workplace safety? Are we reaching
that tipping point where people are taking them as one of the things to seriously consider for the workforce, or they’re a little bit exotic, if you like, with the average warehouse or construction site or company. So tell us about how the market is starting to look at these new technologies now. Well, new, old and new. So new, old, but anyway, whatever is available in the market now.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (07:09)
Yeah, absolutely.
Definitely it’s a little bit of both. Like you said earlier, we are at the beginning of adoption. I don’t think that we have reached either the five or 10 % mark, which is usually considered like you’ve saturated early adoption. I don’t believe that we are there yet. It’s definitely still exotic. It’s definitely still a little bit of a mystery and it can also be seen even a little bit risky.
So I myself have been a manufacturing engineer for many years of my life. And I can say that for the facilities where I worked at, it would be challenging to adopt occupational exoskeletons right now. But also we didn’t do that much heavy lifting or what have you not. But yes, I would say that it’s not just exoskeleton technology that has improved.
over the decades, but it’s also all the peripheral technology. So computer-aided design to be able to visualise what is it that you are making. Digital twin technology, where you can program a task, a repetitive task, and then you can, now we’re starting to see the capability within the modeling software to look at internal forces with or without.
and industrial exoskeleton. We have significantly more complex tools where you can simulate different body sections, different muscle groups, and be able to visualise what is happening. We have better sensor technology that now you can do lab studies, but you can take some of that and also do field studies. So it’s not just that exoskeleton technology has improved, but all the…
material science, evaluation science, visualisation, all the other technologies improving with it.
Maurizio (09:12)
The ecosystem of technologies around the core value properties, the exoskeleton that you’re wearing. And I guess AI will come into play in terms of anticipating movements and so on. So that’s interesting. So while we are talking about this, you mentioned this ecosystem and so on. So perhaps can you expand a little bit on where the technology bets have been placed at the moment?
What are investors investing in and so on? Is there a new generation of exoskeletons that is better? There is obviously passive, there is power, there is upper body, lower body. So there is the all sorts, right? So do you see some patterns in terms of entrepreneurs? You mentioned 150 companies, quite a lot already, but is there any new wave of technologies coming to market or is it a bit more like refinement of existing things?
what you see on the supply side.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (10:11)
Yeah. So obviously the COVID pandemic had a really negative impact on the market because this is a technology that you have to wear. So you can argue if an exoskeleton, an occupational exoskeleton is a tool or a personal protective equipment, all you want, can, we’re not going to go down that rabbit hole.
But at end of the day, you have to put it up. And because it is something that you have to put on, you need to have some level of training, explanation. You need to have people on site to really help facilitate that transition. Because it is not a tool in the classical terms where you grab it, you hold onto it, you do your task and you let go.
It is something that you have to physically put on and the best way to understand an exoskeleton is really to experience it, to have that touch point and to be able to wear it for a little bit and do a task in context with it. So the pandemic limited the ability for companies and distributors, engineers, suppliers, specialists, integrators.
and consultants to be able to enter factories and facilities and interact with the end user, with the employees. So that obviously was bad for sales at the time, but it has created sort of a reset point where it has given a couple of years for all the companies and all the players in this field to think and reevaluate.
Maurizio (11:41)
Okay.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (12:01)
collected the data, composed themselves. So what we’re seeing almost is like a bimodal wave where things were like really picking up to 17 to 18. Then boom, and now again, right now, things are really, really picking up once again. So we artificially kind of had this almost second, third generation of devices. So some of the trends that we are seeing is we’ve come…
Maurizio (12:10)
Then boom, then drop down, picking up slowly.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (12:30)
from full body suits that are trying to do everything to more focused, more specialized looking at one specific body area at a time. And it is almost like a pendulum where now we are seeing also a trend of, okay, let’s do now again, two body parts, three body parts, four body parts at the same time. And by that, I mean not where the exoskeleton attaches necessarily.
but the body segment that it is trying to help with. So typically, right, typically that would be the lower back, the shoulder, the knees, the hips. Absolutely. So it’s almost like a pendulum. We’ve gone from, if you think of the late 90s, from these complex devices that will try to do everything up to 22 motors.
Maurizio (13:05)
like an arm, like an arm, legs.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (13:30)
Okay, let’s just do one body part and now it’s going back in the direction of, okay, we can do two, three, four. Another pendulum effect that we have seen is in terms of complexity of electronic systems. We’ve gone from really complex to let’s just strip everything. Get rid of the motors, get rid of the controllers, try to do it with…
Maurizio (13:41)
That’s very interesting.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (13:58)
springs, gas springs, elastic elements, clever mechanisms, and now we’re seeing this pendulum again move towards complexity, where we have a frame, let’s attach wearable sensors to it, let’s have brakes that engage automatically, so it’s kind of like a quasi-passive device, let’s start going back more towards robotic devices.
Maurizio (14:27)
I suppose it must be in response to what clients are saying. Maybe it’s time for us now to switch to the buy side of this, right? We spoke about the technologies and so much we can talk about, obviously, but let’s explore the buy side. One of the reasons why Safetytech Accelerator does this we do this in the Insight series.
is to give confidence to buyers that the technology is ready and can really make a difference in their operation. I have three questions about the client side. One is whether you have seen a sector or a subsector that is kind of leading the way in adoption. I don’t know if it’s a sweet spot or.
how the technology is just right. don’t know, warehousing, construction. Do you see a sector that’s leading the way or you see it more or less uniformly distributed?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (15:27)
Yeah, so there’s definitely sectors that are leading. So like any technology, you want it to be in the most structured, clean, controlled environment with access to professionals. So if you think about that, like a farm would be as far away from that as you can imagine versus like a car manufacturing plant or an airplane.
Maurizio (15:50)
Right.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (15:56)
manufacturing plant where you have set procedures, the task is well documented, reproducible, you have people on site who are economists, have engineers on site. So what we’ve seen is occupational exoskeletons have really gotten their start in the most structured environments possible and they’re now moving towards less structured environments like
healthcare, farming, construction, and so on. But definitely the start was in high engineering environments.
Maurizio (16:34)
very repetitive,
very repetitive type of tasks like manufacturing or I guess also, what about warehousing? Because it’s one of those that obviously made to the news, well, every now and then we hear about workers lifting objects and so on and MSD and so forth. What about warehousing? should be a low hanging fruit.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (16:59)
Right. Warehousing, so it falls kind of like in between that spectrum. So if we think of the ideal case of a car manufacturing plant, you have up to five minutes of a reproducible task. With warehousing, you can end up having different loads, different materials that need to go on different heights, and you don’t necessarily always have that much space.
Maurizio (17:04)
I see.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (17:29)
to operate within, depending on the distance between the shelving. You don’t usually have engineering support, usually don’t have safety engineering teams inside a warehouse. So that falls kind of like in between and there it becomes more of a question of the safety culture of the facility.
Maurizio (17:43)
you
I really like, I didn’t quite know about this, but I like your spectrum, from highly unstructured to highly structured. it correlates, you’re saying that it correlates quite well with the level of adoption. And that’s incredibly insightful. I cherish that insight. Thank you.
On the same topic, given your, again, unique perspective on this market, some statistics about adoption, but also, are we starting to see some case studies of benefits in terms of safety, but also productivity of using these exoskeletons? And I’m particularly interested, not so much in people reporting the result of pilots, right? Because
A pilot may be great, but then you show the exoskeleton. More interesting, people that are using it now as part of their routine process. It’s become embedded. Are we starting to see some data, some reports about the effectiveness of these devices? Just tell us what you know.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (19:09)
Yeah, in very broad terms, last year there have been quite a few reports that we can see documented productivity gains of around 7 to 10%. There’s also some quality gains, but those have been a little bit more difficult to really put a number against. Like one of the earliest studies.
Maurizio (19:22)
and
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (19:35)
has shown like a 20 % increase in quality. And that is simply a function of employees getting fatigued to the point where they’re having trouble staying within the lines. And with an occupational exoskeleton, that time of fatiguing being extended where they end up getting fatigued to the point where it affects the quality of their work
later. So they’re able to work for a little bit longer. But that hasn’t been as well documented as far as seeing some productivity gains. This time it still remains primarily as a safety tool. So we are saying that it’s kind of like brushing your teeth. You brush your teeth and long term you’re not going to get cavities.
Maurizio (20:09)
So fatigue, yes.
That’s very interesting. So people are starting to see some reduction in MSD and so on, but you’ve got to measure it over a long period of time. It’s not one of those things you see like tomorrow. Is that a fair assessment?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (20:35)
So this
Yes, absolutely. And there have been some longer term studies that a year and a half to a year long in some of the larger corporations, again, going back to car manufacturing, the data looks promising, but there haven’t been any like specific numbers attached to it. So this still remains like a need, this need for long term field longitudinal studies.
but this is still a relatively new technology. In terms of its adoption, the lab studies look extremely promising, but at this point, it’s still like a five to one ratio of lab studies to field studies.
Maurizio (21:33)
Field studies and that’s okay. It’s early adoption phase. The lack of longitudinal studies or deep studies is something we also discovered when we were preparing our report on MSD. And we did call for more work in this space, not just around MSD, but
also the underlying technologies that we listed to combat MSD have got other applications, not just around MSD. And I think one of the barriers is that the volume might not be that high, but also some of the status confidential. I mean, I think companies are no doubt comfortable with sharing everything about, so there is, I think there are a number of barriers to create and start, but I really hope that within
couple of years, three years, we will see much more as technologies get more adopted. But yes, we spotted that gap and thank you for mentioning it. Now, my final question about the client side, the buy side, is return on investment. Now, you mentioned 7%, 10% of productivity in some examples.
We have seen some examples of much higher return, but again, small scale, more like a pilot. So it’s hard to extrapolate from those. But when a company is deciding to trial exoskeletons, I guess that’s the first step that you do. What ROI calculations are going through their mind? You know, the person with the budget, they okay, let’s do this. Is it
a safety calculation? Is it a productivity calculation? So if you know what’s going on to a typical buyer, what’s going through their head when they say, yeah, we’re going to spend 100K on this, where do they see the ROI?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (23:40)
Yeah,
When you say 100K, that will be the total cost of ownership. these devices are typically cheaper, but the total cost of ownership and you have to do procedure changes, you have to figure out how to do storage change procedures, educate, communicate, train. So the total cost of implementation definitely starts to reach that number for sure.
Maurizio (23:48)
Just a random number, but yeah.
Okay.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (24:10)
So I’ve been a manufacturing engineer, like I mentioned before, I would definitely be struggling with that question because safety, at least in the United States is usually viewed as cost avoidance. So you’re trying to avoid worker injury or you’re trying to reduce worker turnout, which is a common problem. Employees not being satisfied with.
Maurizio (24:23)
Mm.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (24:36)
working in manufacturing, production, logistics or warehouse. So you have constant switch. You’re constantly training people. People are leaving. You have to train your people. It’s causing uncertainty. It reduces the productivity of the facility. You have extra costs to that. All of that is very difficult to put into an Excel file.
Because at the end of the day, that is what the business department is going to ask for. How is work going to be done for less? It’s also difficult to see the net impact on the KPI, which is the key productivity metrics for a manufacturing or logistics facility. So right now, this is still an open question. There’s some companies that literally have
return on investment calculators when you go on their websites to look at their occupational exoskeletons and the sales team can definitely help. But at this point, it is still done on a one-on-one basis. What are the priorities at a specific company and facility and how those priorities can match with the implementation of occupational exoskeletons?
Maurizio (25:51)
That’s interesting. Actually, this is also a good segue into my next question. And it’s about barriers to adoption. The ROI is clearly one. You just mentioned it. So getting a clear view of the ROI is something that is not so straightforward to many organisations. But what else? Let’s say the ROI was clear or somebody comes up with a check.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (26:00)
huh.
Maurizio (26:18)
to do this, but are there other barriers to adoption that you see with corporates, for instance, or the workers?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (26:30)
Yeah, absolutely. So great question. It’s almost difficult to segment it into sections, but I’ll do the best that I can. One is obviously psychology. The bicycle is 200, 250 years old. The wheelchair is 3000 years old. Glasses, reading glasses took about 400 years to reach adoption. And that is
nothing but melted sand. And we’re talking about something significantly more complicated than that. So on the one hand, you have psychology, which is work has been done for thousands of years in one way. And now we like saying, well, put this on your body. Or another way to look at it is fear of robots, which has been…
Maurizio (27:20)
Yeah.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (27:28)
cultivated through movies and books and science fiction. And now we’re telling people, go put a robot on your body. So you have psychology. Then after that, you have culture. Are you going to, especially in the United States, this is a youth obsessed culture. No one wants to be seen as being weak. So when you put this on, your coworker is going to be laughing at you.
Maurizio (27:58)
No, I can’t believe this. my God. Okay. That’s interesting.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (27:58)
that you can do your job.
you can do your job
right and like why do need an aid and another bout of culture is buyer culture so let’s say you have a family and you need to get them to school so you need to buy a vehicle a motor vehicle you know intuitively if you need a minivan because you have a large family or if you can get away with a sports car
Maurizio (28:08)
Wow.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (28:31)
or if you need to get a tank. Technically, all three are motor vehicles that can go on a road surface and technically all three of them can get your kids to school. But if you have…
Maurizio (28:45)
And you know, you know
already, you know, you know, right? You don’t have to overthink it. Yeah.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (28:48)
Yeah, and you know, right,
because we’ve had a hundred years of car dealerships, you’ve grown up around cars, you know intuitively what is the right solution for the right task. We are not there yet with occupational exoskeletons. So very often the wrong exoskeleton is used for a specific task, or a specific facility.
So that’s two barriers and the third barrier is not just using it for the right task but being the right solution for the problem. So there’s this hierarchy of controls that people like to always talk about but I feel I thought about it in advance. How can I simplify it? So I have a problem for example
that I have trouble doing the dishes for more than 20 minutes because I’m a pretty tall person and the sink is pretty low for me. I need to bend forward a little bit and my hands are always extended. So that creates a moment time around my back. So as my back muscles are trying to support me, they’re compressing my spine. So every time we have dinner, we have only a few dishes, easy to clean, no problem. I don’t feel any pain or discomfort.
But if we have a party, then now there’s a lot of dishes that need to be done and I am in considerable pain. So then what the hierarchy of control will say is like, the first question is, we eliminate the problem altogether? So in this case, the answer is no, we want to have a party. Some discomfort for cleaning the dishes is not worth it. So first question is, can we eliminate the problem altogether? The second question then,
is can someone else do the task? Can I have my significant other do the dishes? And in my cases, no, I want to help. They’re the ones doing all the cooking. I want to be the one that cleans the dishes and helps. So then the next question becomes this, can we do automation? Can we just put it in a dishwasher and have the machine wash the dishes for us? And in many cases, many households that say yes.
but there can be situations like you can have fancier looking dishes and silverware, which are no longer washing machine compatible. So in manufacturing, we see that all the time. So can you eliminate the process? Can you have someone else do the process, like have another company do it? Can you automate? And is that feasible? So.
Is the process automatable in the first place? Is there the funding to get the automation solution? Will the automation solution work? Then after that, you look at tools. It’s like, okay, can I use a brush to extend the length of my arm so that way I’m not bending forward that much? And that helps with one hand, but then the other hand still needs to use the dishes and they still need to be put in a drying rack. So that doesn’t solve it.
Maurizio (32:05)
I understand.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (32:08)
So then
you keep going down the hierarchy of control and it’s like several levels, seven levels deep. And on the end, in my case, it’s like, okay, I have an exoskeleton and exoskeletons can be used for active dynamic tasks where you are moving, but they can also be set and fitted. So it’s for a static task. So I put on my exoskeleton.
I can clean dishes for two hours. I don’t feel any pain or discomfort.
Maurizio (32:42)
Yeah, but before, so what you’re saying is that before going to the exoskeleton solution, there are so many steps, so many alternatives that tend to be explored. That is, nobody’s rushing to exoskeletons as the first option. They will try training, they will try to change the task and so on. No, that’s incredibly insightful. And we actually,
seeing these sort of dynamics in all sorts of safety technologies because there’s always more training to do and there is always, you know, changing procedures and so on before you get to using technology. That’s incredibly insightful. So thank you very much for this. I like the culture, your perspective on culture and how long it takes for new technologies to be normalized, right? I think these glasses would have seen
I would have looked weak 500 years ago with this. Now it’s normal, isn’t it? And if you think about VR headset, how much big companies are investing in driving adoption, and still I kind of see people wearing one of those outside their home, right?
It’s going to take a while for form factors to be right before you don’t look too nerdy and people don’t still want to talk to you. So it takes time and that’s incredibly subtle. Even for tools that have got almost an obvious benefit like exoskeleton, still that’s the psychological barriers being. Now we’re getting to the end of the recording and I wanted to ask maybe, I think,
wanted to ask you a question that maybe it’s a bit strange, but given your passion about this topic, if you had a magic wand, if you were a magician, a wizard, and you could do something to somehow drive or accelerate the adoption of exoskeletons, what would you do?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (34:46)
Good one. It’s difficult to prioritize and say what would be first, but right now one challenge is fit. An exoskeleton that is the right one for the right task for the right person, if it’s not fitted correctly, if it’s not worn correctly, can actually have a negative effect. So one thing that I will do is have some sort of a tool, something that beeps or confirms
Yes, the the exoskeleton has been put on correctly. I think to me that would be at the top of the list. Another one I would
Maurizio (35:24)
So if I’m
a buyer, I will use this tool and you know what to buy basically. Will be vendor agnostic and so on. So whatever can remove the uncertainty. That’s what you’re saying in buying.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (35:36)
Well, that
would be a separate tool. In this case, this would be for the end user. So you start your shift, you put your exoskeleton on, and it somehow confirms that it has been fitted correctly.
Maurizio (35:48)
When you’re wearing it, when you’re wearing it, it’s measuring
the effect on your body. Understand. That’s amazing.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (35:53)
Yes. And it says like,
well, you need to tighten this strap or that needs to be readjusted or you need to shift this. Because what ends up happening is when you don’t have a good fit on how it’s being worn, how it’s being done, after a while it will start pinching or you don’t feel that assistance anymore. It’s going back to brushing your teeth. If you brush your teeth horizontally,
Maurizio (36:01)
All right.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (36:23)
you’re not going to be as effective as brushing them vertically.
Maurizio (36:26)
Well,
Funnily enough toothbrushes they’re becoming AI powered now. They tell you whether you’re doing it right. So that’s what you mean here. Incredible. And the other one, I guess you were going to say is being able to choose the technology in the first place, I imagine.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (36:33)
Precisely.
Yeah, but that might be a no solution solution. For example, if we look at automation, no company in the United States would be expected to implement automation at a facility on their own. You go to what’s called an integrator, which is not the same as a distributor, but it’s like a distributor consultant and one, it’s an integrator that comes to your facility, does an evaluation and says like, here’s like three different packages where we
get pieces from different vendors that we think can work with what you need.
Maurizio (37:17)
like
the IT consultants basically that come to your business and they tell you whether you got to use this tool or that tool. So you’re saying they got multiple solutions and they either advise or resell you the right solution for you. And they do not exist yet. Is there anyone trying to do that or?
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (37:24)
Uh-huh.
They are
mostly in Europe at that point and there’s a few now literally just getting started in the United States, but we also don’t know. We don’t know what is the future of this technology. We don’t know if it will become ubiquitous enough where it’s like safety glasses, where you literally just buy a few boxes of safety glasses and you let the employees choose which one they like the best.
Maurizio (37:52)
Huh.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (38:09)
Or is it the other end of the spectrum where we end up with this pipeline of integrators and specialised specialists? We just don’t know.
Maurizio (38:18)
That’s lovely. Lovely. Well,
we just have to wait. Bobby, I guess we could talk about this for much, much longer, but I’m afraid that’s all we have time for. And so we need to wrap up now. Thank you. Thank you very much for joining us today and for the pearls of wisdom that you shared with us about this sector. Thank you very much. Thank you. And our pleasure. Thank you.
Borislav “Bobby” Marinov (ExR) (38:42)
and my pleasure.
Maurizio (38:47)
If you would like to learn more about this topic, please do get in touch with us or with Bobby, in fact. Please do check the exoskeleton report. It is a nice website with a lot of information. Or download our latest report on MSD or OSH innovation from our website and a bunch of other things. So just to conclude, thanks everyone for watching this episode.
I’m Maurice Pilu from London. Thank you and goodbye.