More than you might think.
How can machines and systems that “speak” different technical languages still work together?
This is an important question in logistics, where automation and robots play a bigger role every year. At Quinaptis, we test new ideas to find an answer. We first tried it with a Lego robot, and now also with a small Raspberry Pi computer.
Bridging language barriers
Supply chains are becoming more and more automated. Today, some warehouses are already fully automatic. Computer‑controlled cranes move pallets, robots pick orders, and smart systems bring goods to packers in e‑commerce centers. In the future, even transport and delivery may be done by self-driving trucks and vans.
Many of these technologies already exist. But for everything to run smoothly from start to finish, all machines and systems must be able to exchange data and instructions. If they cannot communicate, they cannot work together.
Robots are only as smart as we make them
Right now, this is still a challenge. Automatic cranes and robots are not very smart by themselves. They simply do what the Warehouse Management System (WMS) tells them. If they do not receive a new task, they just stop and wait.
A human worker would use that time to prepare for the next job. But machines cannot do that, because the WMS does not know what will arrive or leave the warehouse later. It only knows what is currently in stock.
Predictive tools, such as the SAP EWM module, can help. But there is another issue: machines like cranes, robots or AGVs communicate through a PLC using structured messages, called telegrams. These telegrams have fixed fields and a fixed format. The machine receives a message, confirms it, carries out the task, and then sends a new message back.
SAP messages, however, look completely different. So SAP and a PLC-controlled robot do not naturally “understand” each other.
The Raspberry PI as interpreter
As SAP SCM specialists, Quinaptis wants to make SAP systems communicate better with logistics equipment. This should make warehouses more efficient and more proactive.
But since SAP and PLCs speak different languages, we need something to translate between them.
To test this idea, we first connected SAP to a Lego robot. This worked a little, but real communication was still difficult.
That’s why we added a Raspberry Pi mini‑computer between SAP and the Lego robot. The Raspberry Pi works like an interpreter. It translates SAP messages into PLC‑style telegrams that the robot can understand. We chose a Raspberry Pi because it is easy to program and very flexible.
The first results look promising.
Why experiment with toys?
We use Lego robots and Raspberry Pis first because it helps us understand how PLCs and telegrams work in a simple, safe way. Once we know how everything fits together, we can scale it up quickly and connect SAP to real warehouse hardware.