The startup has allocated resources to start porting MoveIt! to MoveIt 2, so that MARA, the first ROS 2 running modular robotic arm, can natively interface with it.

The startup has allocated resources to start porting MoveIt! to MoveIt 2, so that MARA, the first ROS 2 running modular robotic arm, can natively interface with it.

MoveIt! is the most widely used open-source software for manipulation in the robotics community. It provides an easy-to-use platform for developing advanced robotics applications, evaluating new robot designs and building integrated robotics products for industrial, commercial, R&D and other domains.

The popular motion planning framework builds on ROS messaging and build systems and utilizes some of the common tools in ROS like the ROS Visualizer (Rviz) and the ROS robot format (URDF). Now, the robotics startup Acutronic Robotics, focused on modularity, has announced that its team will help to create a native ROS 2 version of MoveIt! in order to get robots running on ROS 2 directly interface with the framework.

The startup has already started the process of porting MoveIt! to ROS 2, a work that can be tracked at http://github.com/acutronicrobotics/moveit2

Acutronic Robotics has also funded PickNik, a robotic software company, that will help steer the development efforts and advise Acutronic Robotics in the process of making the MARA modular robotic arm the first fully-supported MoveIt 2 robot.
Acutronic Robotics' current work in modular robotics, and particularly with the freshly launched MARA modular robotic arm, justifies the startup's contribution to the community on this matter. Running on ROS 2, MARA will be able to interface with the motion planning framework natively, once ported to MoveIt 2.