OSLO: Elop AS and DEKRA Visatec GmbH entered LOI with intention to finalize commercial agreement in august and to launch their new combined solution in the market early next year.
The two companies intend to combine Elop’s patented rolling ultrasound technology with a vacuum crawler designed for concrete structures to create the “InsightCrawler” – an inspection robot that will be able to climb vertically on concrete infrastructure such as dams, cooling towers and bridges to provide an efficient mapping of its internal condition.
By coupling this unique data with Elop’s cloud-based system, infrastructure owners can see interior cracks, air pockets, voids and delamination, allowing them to identify issues that must be addressed at an early stage.
“To enter a collaboration with DEKRA Visatec underlines the global potential of Elop’s technology. The size and geographical footprint of DEKRA group is also illustrative for how we jointly view the market potential for the InsightCrawler,” says Øivind Horpestad, executive chairman of Elop.
DEKRA is one of the leading global providers of industrial inspection services for infrastructure. The DEKRA group has a workforce of around 44,000 people working in approximately 60 countries on six continents and is the world’s largest unlisted expert organisation in the TIC (testing, inspection, certification) industry.
“We are confident that there is a huge market out there, and we believe DEKRA and Elop together can fill the market void for more efficient inspection of concrete structures,” says Marcus Jocham, Vice President Global Services Sales, Mechanized NDT – Robotics – Inspection Technology, at DEKRA Group.
DEKRA Visatec and Elop aim to launch the commercial version of InsightCrawler during the first quarter of 2022.
DEKRA Visatec intends to demonstrate the product within its group companies and, when possible, use the InsightCrawler for ongoing infrastructure inspection projects.
DEKRA Visatec and Elop estimate the possible annual sales volume within Dekra network to be between 60-80 InsightCrawlers within two years after the product is completed, such sales volume expects to increase further in the following years. Each unit is estimated a price between EUR 200-250K.