Upper-body wearable (two hands) force-reflecting (haptic) exoskeleton

Tampere University Foundation sr (Tampere University) is about to execute a direct procurement of an upper-body wearable (two hands) force-reflecting (haptic) exoskeleton. The exoskeleton is procured for bilateral master-slave control system research and development, see its more detailed requirements are given below. In terms of hardware requirements, TAU was looking for a 6+ degrees-of-freedom, actively controlled upper-body type commercial of the shelf exoskeleton that consists of two arms and hands relevant for our main target application. Our target application is force-reflecting teleoperation system with two hands holding and manipulating an object. In terms of software requirements, interfaces with common software packages and modifiability of low-level controllers were considered to be crucial. Exoskeleton must provide an application programming interface (API) with Matlab/Simulink at 1000 Hz communication rate, a necessity for master-slave teleoperation systems functioning in hard real-time. Exoskeleton control system must allow modification of their low-level hardware controller parameters and control algorithm, which enables scientific research concerning the human-robot interaction in a master-slave teleoperation system.

According to the section 40 of the Act on Public Procurement and Concession Contracts 1397/2016 a contracting entity may opt for direct procurement if only a certain supplier can implement the procurement for a technical reason, or for a reason related to protecting an exclusive right; it shall be a further condition that there are no reasonable alternatives or substitute solutions, and that the absence of competition is not due to an artificial narrowing of the terms and conditions of the procurement. The contracting unit carried out a thorough market survey with the outcome that only one supplier can meet the demands and requirements. The technical requirements listed in the section of "Procurement description" are matched only by Haption Able upper-body two arm exoskeleton.