Next Best Thing to Collaborative Robot

There is a lot of chatter about collaborative robots in my industry. But here at BTS, we have been doing "safe to work with" automation for many years. The problem with robotics is the space required to deploy them. How do you put a robot in a space that is already surrounded by people and equipment? Many machines have a need for specialized automation for performing ancillary functions such as placing sheets for
pallets, stacking bags and boxes or assisting someone by flipping parts and placing them into position. Imagine if you had to place electronics on a board. Years ago the parts were huge and a human could do it. Today they are so small, you would have to work with tweezers and a microscope to build a cell phone.