Data center infrastructure manufacturer Tate has increased welding output per welder by a factor of twelve after deploying 58 collaborative welding robots across three US production facilities. The company says the automation has also reduced rework, standardized weld quality and allowed skilled welders to focus on more complex tasks.
Tate has installed the Hirebotics Cobot Welder systems at plants in Arkansas, Virginia and Kentucky. The manufacturer produces structural ceilings, containment systems and airflow management products for large data centers, a market in which production volumes and delivery requirements have increased rapidly.
To expand capacity, Tate began moving repetitive welding work from manual production to cobot-based automation in 2024. According to Hirebotics, the resulting setup has increased throughput on critical structural assemblies to twelve times the previous output per human welder.
At the same time, Tate has continued to recruit certified welders. Rather than replacing those employees, the company says the cobots are primarily being used for repetitive welding operations, while skilled workers concentrate on jobs requiring certification, judgment and manual craftsmanship.
Programming without robotics experience
The cobots are controlled through Hirebotics’ cloud-based Beacon Pro platform. Operators can create, run and monitor welding programs from a smartphone or tablet instead of using a conventional robot teach pendant. According to the case study, employees without previous robotics experience can learn to operate the systems within 10 to 20 minutes.
The software also allows Tate to define welding parameters such as torch angle, amperage, heat input and travel speed in advance. Once these settings have been validated, operators can repeat the same process across multiple parts and production sites.
“We can manipulate and curate every single weld that we make here for Tate to be exactly how it’s supposed to be as by spec every single time,” says Jonathon Cook, Cobot Welding Programmer at Tate. This approach has also reduced variation between individual welders. Tate says the resulting consistency has helped eliminate rework caused by differences in manual welding.
One welding network across three factories
Another result of the deployment is that Tate can manage the 58 systems as a connected production network. Welding programs and parameters can be shared between facilities, enabling the company to use the same production settings at different locations.
In Arkansas, Tate has taken the automation a step further. Cobot welders are used for tacking and pre-assembling components before they are passed to larger industrial robots further down the production line. The company says this helps maintain a steady production flow and reduces bottlenecks between individual automation stages.
After two years of using the welding cobots, Tate has also started applying the same software platform to another production process. The company is among the first users of Hirebotics’ Cobot Painter, which uses the same Beacon Pro environment and access structure as the welding systems.
The deployment illustrates how Tate is using collaborative robots not only to increase welding capacity, but also to standardize production across multiple factories. The most significant result remains the increase in productivity: twelve times more output per welder on selected structural assemblies, combined with lower rework and a larger workforce of certified welders.
