User Story: Flasheye and LKAB Collaborate to Enhance Machine Safety

View of different zone levels

Flasheye is collaborating with LKAB to develop digital fences using lidar technology as an alternative to traditional mechanical fencing. The goal is simple. Improve safety while cutting complexity, maintenance, and cost in heavy industrial environments. A critical part of this collaboration has been solving a major part of the regulatory challenge. Ensuring that digital fences meet safety requirements is essential for real world deployment. Together, Flasheye and LKAB have addressed key regulatory and safety compliance aspects, making lidar based digital fencing a viable and trustworthy alternative to mechanical solutions.

In many industrial sites, safety fencing has barely changed in decades. Steel fences, gates, interlocks, and robot cells create physical barriers that are expensive to build, hard to modify, and costly to maintain. With lidar based digital fences, safety is enforced through precise detection of movement and presence, not metal structures. Instead of building walls around machines and processes, lidar sensors define virtual safety zones that automatically stop or slow equipment when people or vehicles enter restricted areas.

Why this changes industrial safety

1. Far lower maintenance and lifecycle cost

Mechanical fences wear down. Hinges break, gates misalign, and safety switches fail. Every modification to a production line often requires rebuilding parts of the fence.Digital fences have no moving parts. Once installed and calibrated, the system is maintained through software and sensor health monitoring, dramatically reducing downtime and service costs.

2. One sensor can protect large areas

Traditional robot cells require fencing around each individual process or machine and have short range coverage. This leads to fragmented layouts and duplicated safety equipment.A single lidar sensor can monitor wide zones and complex geometries, covering areas that would normally require multiple fenced cells. This allows open layouts, safer traffic flow, and better use of floor space.

3. Safety that adapts to real operations while meeting regulations

Mechanical fences are static. If operations change, the fence must be rebuilt. Sometimes, the mechanical fences are never put back after maintenance. Digital fences can adapt. Safety zones can be adjusted for different modes, speeds, or tasks, while still meeting regulatory and safety requirements. This makes it easier to automate more processes without locking facilities into rigid layouts.

A step toward safer, more flexible industry

For LKAB, operating in demanding environments with large machinery and vehicle traffic, digital fencing opens new possibilities. Safer interaction between people and machines, fewer physical barriers, and systems designed to comply with safety standards from the start. This is a key foundation for introducing autonomous vehicles and robots. For Flasheye, the collaboration is another step toward redefining how industrial safety is designed, shifting from heavy infrastructure to intelligent perception.

About Flasheye

Flasheye is a leading provider of lidar based perception software for industrial infrastructure. The company develops digital, robust alternatives to traditional safety systems, improving flexibility, lowering cost, and increasing safety. Flasheye’s technology enables large scale area protection and intelligent perception for modern industrial operations.

flasheye.se

About LKAB

LKAB is an international mining and minerals group with operations focused on iron ore, minerals, and sustainable industrial transformation. The company is a global leader in high quality iron ore products and is driving innovation in safety, automation, and low impact industrial processes.

lkab.com