Realtime Robotics appoints Ville Lehtonen vice president of product

By The Robot Report Staff | December 1, 2024

Realtime Robotics, a leader in collision-free autonomous motion planning for industrial robots, last week named industry veteran Ville Lehtonen as its vice president of product.

Lehtonen brings experience in technology, product, and management, said Realtime Robotics. He most recently served as head of product at Pickle Robot Co., which he guided to a leadership position in the truck and container loading and unloading industry.

“Ville’s track record speaks for itself, and we’re confident he will be an excellent addition to the team,” said Kevin Carlin, chief commercial officer at Realtime Robotics.

“Our Optimization solution is already helping several manufacturing companies to reduce cycle times and improve productivity,” Carlin stated. “With Ville’s expertise, we can evolve to meet additional customer needs and expand its adoption throughout the manufacturing and logistics industries.”

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Lehtonen expects ‘a massive gear change’

Prior to Pickle, Lehtonen was head of product for HighRes Biosolutions, a laboratory automation software company, and he was a co-founder and CEO of LabMinds Ltd., a laboratory automation company.

Lehtonen holds a BS and an MS in computer science from the Helsinki University of Technology and an MBA from Oxford University.

“I look forward to helping already highly automated production lines become even more efficient and cost-effective with the use of Realtime’s Optimization technology,” he said. “I am confident we can help manufacturers save tens of thousands of hours on their industrial robotics projects.”

“What Realtime is doing is a massive gear change in deploying automation,” Lehtonen added. “While this will be incredibly helpful for current manufacturers, the most exciting opportunities come from unlocking the economics for companies operating on a far smaller scale than the heavy users of robots. Realtime’s technology stack also can do for kinematics what real-time object-detection frameworks like YOLO [You Only Look Once] have done for computer vision, further lowering the barriers to entry in the robotics space.”

About Realtime Robotics

Boston-based Realtime Robotics said its technology generates optimized motion plans and interlocks to achieve the shortest possible cycle time in single and multi-robot workcells. The company claimed that its systems expand the potential of automation, empowering multiple robots to work closely together in unstructured and collaborative workspaces, reacting to dynamic obstacles the instant changes are perceived.

Realtime said its Optimization product uses a combination of proprietary software and experienced robotics and application engineering insights to drastically improve a manufacturer’s overall productivity. The system analyzes a customer’s existing digital twin, identifying bottleneck areas and recommending improvements based on desired parameters. 

Optimization can do all of this without interfering with ongoing production efforts, said Realtime Robotics.