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Strategy Briefing

In Pursuit of the “Perfect Wash”: Laundry Automation - Ironing and Folding Systems

73 pages, Jun 2018

US$1,325

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About This Report

New Report Guarantee

If you purchase a report that is updated in the next 60 days, we will send you the new edition and data extract FREE!

The automation of home laundry has sat in R&D technology pipelines for decades, usually as a “blue sky” ideal to strive for. IFA 2017 and CES 2018 both revealed new technologies as well as an interesting new process philosophy that serves to re-frame this topic. Automation across the laundry process is now seen as more feasible and inside a more realistic device footprint. A post-2020 full solution is in the works and its proliferation has become a calculation of when…not if.

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Overview

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Gain competitive intelligence about market leaders. Track key industry trends, opportunities and threats. Inform your marketing, brand, strategy and market development, sales and supply functions.

Ironing reveals the automation barrier of wash load batches

Ironing and folding are not viable as batch processes and even manually they need to be separated into individual garments for this stage. The process gap between finishing a wash and dry phase, then waiting and accumulating clothing to start the ironing phase causes a far harder ironing mission.

Chemical additive, appliance and apparel brands have all tried “easy iron” stories

Via fabric conditioning sprays, refresh functions in laundry appliances, specific refresh appliances, and garments that don’t need to be ironed, the laundry brands across all stakeholder industries know the value of solving ironing…but all have so far delivered incomplete solutions that aid but don’t remove ironing.

There is a start-up in the UK that promises to automate ironing for USD900

Effie is launching late 2018 with a price of GBP699 (USD900) offering a automated ironing solution using pressurised steam. Users need to hang clothing on Effie hangers. Up to 12 items can be loaded at once, and each garment is ironed and folded in six minutes (72 minutes cycle time). This uses fragrance pods, with an indication this will be own label. It is perceived that this function, minus the articulation, is similar to the thinking of Laundroid’s 2020-2024 prototype. The limiting factor is the same as the washing machine -it needs a human to load it and unload, so articulation is needed to remove another layer of intervention (it suffers some small element of batch thinking still), but this is a very promising launch.

Laundroid points the way 2020-2024

Only once we escape batch wash loads and see this in context of a customised production line do mature technology options become clear, where the refresh and ironing sits immediately after (or during) the drying phase, and we need robotic garment manipulation for this automation trend to be realised.

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Introduction

Scope

What This Report Series is All About

How this reports fits in to the overall picture for the “Perfect Wash”

The 2017 Laundroid is a pebble; the >2020 upgrade is a mountain

There is also a “new” kid on the block

The purpose of this file within the “Perfect Wash” report series

Topics to expect in this file: “Ironing and Folding Systems”

If you have already examined other reports in the series…

Other reports in the series: When can we expect automation?

Topics covered in the “ When can we expect automation?” report

Other reports in the series: Sorting Systems

Topics covered in the “Sorting Systems” report

Other reports in the series: Washing Systems

Topics covered in the “Washing Systems” report

An Introduction to the Perfect Wash

Drivers and barriers make this all about complexity and psychology

Gender roles and bias are a mire that automation could step into

Laundry is not simple; it has more variables than we tend to think

We struggle to trust ourselves with laundry: What hope for robots?

Fine fabrics are the extreme test of this trust issue

The bottom line for trust

Laundroid creates a paradigm shift

Failure can lie in the question unasked, not just a solution unfound

Outmoded Thinking

Stuck in a batch

The dogma of wash load batch thinking

Customised “new” thinking

If wash loads require sorting, then sorting requires a lot of space

If we skip sorting, compromising the results is unavoidable!

Customisation opens up superior process options

Escaping from old assumptions and limitations is never simple

Robots just don’t need to care…sorting is a batch wash issue only

And this is insidious in futurology…we need to take a step back

New perspectives are brought to the table by new voices

New robotics partners bring new thinking

Is Laundroid’s claim for post-2020 capability a paper tiger?

An initial view at process maps and the laundry process “phases”

There are three variables driving the types of solution to automation

The matrix of these variables provides the structure of this report

Mind the gap: Who are Laundroid’s other partners?

It is the same looking at Bosch’s Foldimate alliance (CES 2018)

Who will bring the world’s first totally automated process to market?

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems

Key findings (Ironing and Folding Systems)

A labour of love…and also an extreme labour of Sisyphus

How ironing fits into laundry for time (and gender efforts)

The full laundry (batch) process map for human intervention

Process map: What does solving ironing do for automation?

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems - Batch Production Thinking

Conditioners have “crease release” brand messages

The successes and limitations of steam versus ironing

Brazilian pride from perfectly un-creased socks

The low tech origin to steam in laundry and refresh cabinets

Refresh cabinets as an incomplete replacement for ironing

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems - Customised Production Line Thinking

How well do chemicals do at preventing the need for ironing?

Anti-wrinkle sprays are a labour-saving help: Within limitations

Swash is closer to adding value auto-refreshing a single garment

Tersa Steam is a “naturals ” wall-mounted upgrade of Swash

Tersa Steam: How is this different from what came before?

Non-iron shirts are popular but also foster online opposition

There are issues to overcome for the “user experience”

Foldimate is expected at the end of 2019 (via a deal with BSH)

A connection between Foldimate and BSH is interesting in itself

Effie is a UK-based “item by item” automated ironing cabinet

Effie is planned to enter the market by the end of 2018

There are less commercial (academic) solutions in the works

This break in the process is making ironing far harder than needed

Laundroid’s 2020-2024 prototype makes the refresh story better

Ironing during the drying process is a performance multiplier

Ironing illuminates automation limitations for batch thinking

“Impossible” is invalid for automation; “Inevitable" is more accurate

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Want to find out more about this report?

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Megatrends

Strategy Briefing

In Pursuit of the “Perfect Wash”: Laundry Automation - Ironing and Folding Systems

New Report Guarantee

About This Report

New Report Guarantee

Overview

Why buy this report?

Ironing reveals the automation barrier of wash load batches

Chemical additive, appliance and apparel brands have all tried “easy iron” stories

There is a start-up in the UK that promises to automate ironing for USD900

Laundroid points the way 2020-2024

Want to find out more about this report?

Table of Contents

Introduction

Scope

What This Report Series is All About

How this reports fits in to the overall picture for the “Perfect Wash”

The 2017 Laundroid is a pebble; the >2020 upgrade is a mountain

There is also a “new” kid on the block

The purpose of this file within the “Perfect Wash” report series

Topics to expect in this file: “Ironing and Folding Systems”

If you have already examined other reports in the series…

Other reports in the series: When can we expect automation?

Topics covered in the “ When can we expect automation?” report

Other reports in the series: Sorting Systems

Topics covered in the “Sorting Systems” report

Other reports in the series: Washing Systems

Topics covered in the “Washing Systems” report

An Introduction to the Perfect Wash

Drivers and barriers make this all about complexity and psychology

Gender roles and bias are a mire that automation could step into

Laundry is not simple; it has more variables than we tend to think

We struggle to trust ourselves with laundry: What hope for robots?

Fine fabrics are the extreme test of this trust issue

The bottom line for trust

Laundroid creates a paradigm shift

Failure can lie in the question unasked, not just a solution unfound

Outmoded Thinking

Stuck in a batch

The dogma of wash load batch thinking

Customised “new” thinking

If wash loads require sorting, then sorting requires a lot of space

If we skip sorting, compromising the results is unavoidable!

Customisation opens up superior process options

Escaping from old assumptions and limitations is never simple

Robots just don’t need to care…sorting is a batch wash issue only

And this is insidious in futurology…we need to take a step back

New perspectives are brought to the table by new voices

New robotics partners bring new thinking

Is Laundroid’s claim for post-2020 capability a paper tiger?

An initial view at process maps and the laundry process “phases”

There are three variables driving the types of solution to automation

The matrix of these variables provides the structure of this report

Mind the gap: Who are Laundroid’s other partners?

It is the same looking at Bosch’s Foldimate alliance (CES 2018)

Who will bring the world’s first totally automated process to market?

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems

Key findings (Ironing and Folding Systems)

A labour of love…and also an extreme labour of Sisyphus

How ironing fits into laundry for time (and gender efforts)

The full laundry (batch) process map for human intervention

Process map: What does solving ironing do for automation?

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems - Batch Production Thinking

Conditioners have “crease release” brand messages

The successes and limitations of steam versus ironing

Brazilian pride from perfectly un-creased socks

The low tech origin to steam in laundry and refresh cabinets

Refresh cabinets as an incomplete replacement for ironing

Automation: Ironing and Folding Systems - Customised Production Line Thinking

How well do chemicals do at preventing the need for ironing?

Anti-wrinkle sprays are a labour-saving help: Within limitations

Swash is closer to adding value auto-refreshing a single garment

Tersa Steam is a “naturals ” wall-mounted upgrade of Swash

Tersa Steam: How is this different from what came before?

Non-iron shirts are popular but also foster online opposition

There are issues to overcome for the “user experience”

Foldimate is expected at the end of 2019 (via a deal with BSH)

A connection between Foldimate and BSH is interesting in itself

Effie is a UK-based “item by item” automated ironing cabinet