Agility Robotics and FORT Partnered for Digit 5 Safety
The companies are building an offboard bridge to integrate humanoid robots into existing industrial safety systems.
Updated on Oct. 6, 2026 in Robotics
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Agility Robotics and FORT Robotics have announced a strategic partnership to develop a safety architecture for the Digit 5 humanoid robot. The collaboration focuses on creating an offboard bridge that links robot motion control directly to industrial facility safety infrastructure.
Why it matters
As humanoid robots move into active workspaces, the partnership addresses the critical challenge of ensuring machines reliably cooperate with human workers in industrial environments. This system aims to standardize safety interfaces for sites like factories and warehouses.
The system relies on an Offboard Safety Bridge that integrates human detection, safety cues, and motion control with external infrastructure. It builds upon a previous pendant sled for emergency-stop functionality, now expanded into a broader safety architecture.
The players
Agility Robotics
A developer of bipedal humanoid robots designed for logistics and industrial manipulation tasks.
FORT Robotics
A safety technology company specializing in wireless control and emergency-stop systems for autonomous machines.
The details
The safety architecture incorporates a multi-layered approach, utilizing a safety pendant for manual overrides during maintenance and setup. The Offboard Safety Bridge functions as a communication layer that bridges the robot with external industrial safety protocols. This enables real-time synchronization between the robot's motion control systems and site-specific safety measures to ensure human-robot cooperation.
Timeline
October 6, 2026: The companies announced their expanded partnership.
The Tech Race
This collaboration follows a pattern established by the ISO 10218 safety standards for industrial robots. It represents a significant step in adapting fixed-automation safety protocols for the more dynamic, unpredictable environments navigated by modern humanoid platforms.
Industrial facilities currently employing Digit robots will eventually gain access to this integrated safety bridge for their fleet. Users can expect this to standardize emergency-stop and manual-override workflows across different deployment sites.
The takeaway
The partnership demonstrates that humanoid safety is shifting from isolated robot overrides to facility-wide integration. Watch for forthcoming deployment specifications for Digit 5 as the companies begin providing regulatory compliance support for industrial clients.
Further reading
For more on how new hardware is being integrated into industrial spaces, see our Robotics coverage.
Source note: This article includes information reported by Intelligentcio.
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