Joseph F. Engelberger was born on July 26, 1925, and died on December 1, 2015.
He was an American physicist, engineer and entrepreneur.
Licensing the original patent awarded to inventor George Devol, Engelberger developed the first industrial robot in the United States, the Unimate, in the 1950s.
Later he worked as an entrepreneur and vocal advocate of robotic technology beyond the manufacturing plant in a variety of fields, including service industries, health care, and space exploration.
In 1956, Joseph founded Unimation Inc., which was the world’s first robotics company.
Two years earlier Devol had already secured the patents for the robot technology.
The first industrial robot was installed at the General Motors Inland Fisher Guide Plant in Ewing Township, New Jersey in 1961.
Over the next two decades, the Japanese took the lead by investing heavily in robots to replace people performing certain tasks.
In Japan, Engelberger is widely hailed as a key player in the postwar ascendancy of Japanese manufacturing quality and efficiency.
Joseph Engelberger passed away at age 90 in December 2015.