From Code to Growth: Tips for Monetizing Your Robot Software with RoboDK Add-ins

Developing your robotic software is just the beginning. As a solutions provider, you know how important it is to find new users and tap into key partnerships. Enter the RoboDK Add-ins Marketplace!

If you want to grow your reach as a robot software provider, it’s important not to do everything in a vacuum. Robotic systems rely on interoperability and collaboration.

This can make it challenging to find new users.

How can you grow your user base when potential users don’t even know you exist? It can feel like there is just too much competition within the robotics industry!

A powerful option is to offer your solution to an existing community of passionate robot users and streamline your tool, making it easy for them to adopt it.

With RoboDK Add-ins, you can tap into the growing trend for collaboration and monetize your software in the progress…

The Growing Landscape of Robot Collaboration

With the increasing demand for robotic solutions across industries, customers are starting to realize how complex it can be to source and integrate robotic solutions.

Robotic systems often contain components from multiple different providers. It’s hard to consolidate suppliers for hardware components, given how complex it is to develop hardware. As a result, users often opt to reduce the number of software tools they are using for simplicity.

How do you, as a software provider, stand out in this situation?

You know your tool could help people… but how can you convince them to incorporate yet another software component into their robot cell?

The answer is collaboration! By catering your software tool to an already-thriving ecosystem of software components — like the RoboDK Add-in Marketplace — you make it much more likely new customers will try out your solution.

Why RoboDK Add-ins are Game-Changers

RoboDK Add-ins are transforming the way robot users think about software tools and functionality.

In the not-too-distant past, robot users had two main options for adding advanced functionality: develop it themselves or hire a specialist. This required significant skill in robot programming and took a lot of time. As a result, most deployments required a specialist integrator to combine software components.

Add-ins provide an accessible way for users to add your advanced and application-specific functionality to their RoboDK installation, no software integration required.

As a provider of software solutions, this means you can pre-integrate your tools to RoboDK to streamline the process for your new users. By submitting your tool to the Add-in Marketplace, keen robot users will soon employ your tool in their applications, safe knowing that you have made sure it plays well with RoboDK.

How to Tell if Developing a RoboDK Add-in Is Right for You?

Before you adapt your tool into a RoboDK Add-in, it’s important to check if this makes sense for you. While there are strong benefits to offering your tool to RoboDK users, it needs to be the right strategic decision for your business.

Here are a few questions to guide your thinking:

  • Is there a demand for your tool among robot users? The best Add-ins are those that solve genuine user problems and challenges. If your tool is a new idea that you don’t already offer, conduct market research to evaluate the demand for your intended Add-in.
  • Are you committed to making a genuinely useful software tool? RoboDK users respond best to tools that solve real-world problems for their robot developments or offer extra functionality that makes their lives easier. Your tool can do well if you are also committed to delivering on this.
  • Is your company ready for user growth? Make sure that you are ready for your tool to gain more users. This new revenue stream could produce a spike in new users, if your Add-in is very successful.

By reflecting on such questions, you can better gauge whether developing a RoboDK Add-in aligns with your company strategy.

A Practical Guide to Developing and Launching a RoboDK Add-in

Launching your Add-in for the RoboDK Add-in Marketplace is a straightforward.

Here are the 6 basic steps for creating an Add-in:

  1. Begin with the App Template — We have created an app template to streamline the process of development. It contains various features and examples to get you up and running quickly.
  2. Customize Your Scripts — Modify, add, and remove scripts to tailor the functionality of your Add-in to align with your tool’s specific tasks or applications.
  3. Enhance With Icons — Adding icons is a great way to align your Add-in with your company’s branding, improve visual appeal, and enhance user interaction by making functionality easily recognizable.
  4. Package with the Add-in Creator — The Add-in Creator allows you to easily package your software tool into a RoboDK RDKP file, a crucial step for deploying to the Add-in Marketplace.
  5. Install, Configure, and Test — Before submitting your tool to the Marketplace, test it thoroughly. Install it to a vanilla version of RoboDK and make any necessary updates to ensure it functions correctly.
  6. Distribute via the RoboDK Marketplace — Finally, submit your Add-in for consideration in the Marketplace, along with information about your company and the Add-in as described in our documentation page.

For a detailed guide to this process, see the Add-ins page of the RoboDK documentation.

The Path Forward for Robot Software Developers

RoboDK Add-ins represent a tremendous opportunity for you, as a robot software developer, to monetize your tools and better serve robot users.

With this fresh stream of users, you can set your company up to grow its user base and reach new audiences.

For examples of the types of Add-ins that we already offer, check out the Add-in Marketplace.

What does your software tool do? Tell us in the comments below or join the discussion on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or in the RoboDK Forum.. Also, check out our extensive video collection and subscribe to the RoboDK YouTube Channel

About Alex Owen-Hill

Alex Owen-Hill is a freelance writer and public speaker who blogs about a large range of topics, including science, presentation skills at CreateClarifyArticulate.com, storytelling and (of course) robotics. He completed a PhD in Telerobotics from Universidad Politecnica de Madrid as part of the PURESAFE project, in collaboration with CERN. As a recovering academic, he maintains a firm foot in the robotics world by blogging about industrial robotics.

View all posts by Alex Owen-Hill