FANUC Displays Food-Grade and End-of-Line Robotics at PACK EXPO

At PACK EXPO, FANUC reinforced its position as an industry leader with its yellow robots, highlighting food and packaging automation with a display of technologies designed for safe, efficient, and flexible production. From industrial and collaborative robots to high-speed delta and SCARA robots, FANUC's booth illustrated solutions tailored for safe food handling, end-of-line operations, and everything in between.

CRX Synchronization

One main highlight of the booth was a multi-robot collaborative cell that used FANUC’s CRX robots working together to load and unload trays of cookies from an oven, simulating a real-world baking application. Another CRX unit was deployed to inspect food-labeled boxes using the FANUC 3DV/200 vision sensor, showing how machine vision can be used, not just for positioning, but to enhance quality assurance by detecting labeling errors and inconsistencies.

Every home could benefit from a robot that makes freshly-baked cookies!

This demonstration showed off the capabilities of cobots in a medium-payload environment, blending safety and strength with a robot series that is enabled by intuitive programming.

Washdown Robots

FANUC also demonstrated a special variation of its delta robot series, which was featured in an all-new washdown-ready configuration. The DR-3iB/6 stainless steel delta robot placed sausage links into packaging, demonstrating hygienic handling in conjunction with vision-guided orientation.

Alongside the delta robot was a The coordinated action between the two robots highlighted their flexibility and suitability for high-mix, fast-paced food processing lines.

Hygienic SCARA Robots

A hygienic application uses safeguards to prevent dirt and grease from entering food environments. In many cases, that means food-grade lubrication and sealed components that prevent contaminants.

In the booth, an SR-12iA/C SCARA robot operated within a simulated bakery environment, where it performed precise cake slicing (which may be ultrasonic in a real-world situation) with flexible bellows protecting the environment from contaminants coming from moving parts. This new demo illustrated how SCARA robots can be adapted for specialized tasks such as portioning and decorating in bakery or dessert production lines.

At PACK EXPO 2025, FANUC simulated cake slicing while protecting the environment from contamination.

Specialists in Palletizing

End-of-line packaging solutions also played a central role at FANUC’s exhibit. An M-710 robot demonstrated palletizing and depalletizing, offering safe and efficient handling of packaged food in warehouse or distribution center environments.

In another higher-payload scenario, an M-410 robot, equipped with a custom gripper, handled much larger payloads with speed and stability.

An M-410 palletizing robot demonstrates large-payload handling capabilities.

FANUC Raises the Packaging Bar

As labor shortages and hygiene standards continue to shape food production and packaging industries, FANUC’s PACK EXPO booth displayed some of the advantages of robotic automation: adaptable, cleanroom-ready, and easy to deploy. FANUC gave a clear picture of today’s robotic solutions, but also inspired a brief vision of the future of some of the more tailored robotic designs that will serve the packaging industry in future generations of robotics.

All images used courtesy of the author.