Glossary · Business
Human-robot collaboration
Also known as: HRC
In brief
Human-robot collaboration is the deployment pattern where a robot and a human worker share a workspace and a task, rather than the robot operating in a fenced-off cell. For humanoids, HRC is the dominant deployment model — the form factor exists precisely to fit human-shaped workspaces.
Traditional industrial robots were caged off because they were dangerous to be near. Cobots reduced the danger but kept the structured-task assumption. Humanoids targeting human workspaces (warehouses, hospitals, retail back-of-house) inherit the constraint that they must work safely alongside humans without specialized infrastructure.
HRC has implications for control (compliance, safe-by-design), perception (must reliably detect humans), and certification (ISO 10218, ISO/TS 15066, ANSI/RIA R15.06).
Related terms
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Glossary entries are upstream. The catalog is where the implementations live.