Careers of Tomorrow: Mechatronics and Robotics

The educational system, especially engineering programs, has undergone significant transformations globally over the years. Passé days when pursuing engineering were solely limited to electrical, mechanical, and computer science-related fields. In the present times, the need for specialized skills led to the innovations in the course curriculum to cope with the ever-evolving tech industry and supply the right talent with requisite knowledge of state-of-the-art technologies and possessing the relevant industry-specific and soft skills.

One noticeable outcome of this trend is that the field of Mechatronics and Robotics has gained prominence at unimaginable levels. These new-age technologies are responsible for bringing machines to life, maintaining them, fixing them in case of any irregularities, and designing and building state-of-the-art models. LinkedIn’s Emerging Jobs Report 2020 points out a similar trend. It states that technology-related jobs that involve robotics, Artificial Intelligence, automation, and data scientists, will rise exponentially in the future and will remain at the forefront of tech growth.

Mechatronics and Robotics: Two peas in a pod

Mechatronics forms the essential foundation for the growth in automation involving manufacturing. Mechatronics is a multi-disciplinary field involving a combination of mechanical engineering, electronics, and computing, and it is emerging to be a feasible career option in the future. With the ever-evolving growth of automation in the manufacturing sector, robot-driven assembly lines have resulted in mechatronics being an emerging field the feasible career options of the future. In simple words, mechatronics engineers design, develop, maintain, and manage high-technology engineering systems to automate industrial tasks. The industry now demands skills like Mechatronics and Robotics to bridge the talent-skill gap. The growth of the newly introduced career prospects and jobs requiring disruptive tech skills have further driven the demand for human resources with tech-savvy and high-end skillsets.

Mechatronics emerging as a viable career option

Mechatronics blends mechanical, electrical, and computer sciences to design, produce and operate intelligent machines that can work accurately and precisely and for long hours. A combination of mechanisms and electronics, it is a hands-on course that integrates requisite practical exposure with theoretical knowledge. It offers diverse skills in manufacturing processes, statistics, industrial control principles, practical physics, machine design elements, and kinematics, along with Mechatronic control systems and programmable logic controllers.

Mechatronics specialists bring the best of various worlds of mechanical, electrical, and computer science fundamentals to the table. Post pursuing such degrees, there are different career prospects, including engineers in agriculture, automotive, telecommunications, robotics, and biomedical engineering. These specialists usually work with various industrial robots, such as in pick and place operations, control systems for bottling or packaging consumer products majorly in the food and beverage market,  drones, prototype development, and designing control systems.

It is an ideal career path for those students and professionals who are inclined towards mechanics, robotics, production equipment, creative problem-solving, and enjoy hard-core technical and engineering activities. The Mechatronics aspirants can seek jobs in industries across manufacturing, mining, robotics, aviation, transport, defense, etc. They are also employed by manufacturing corporations involved in high-volume production. Additionally, cybersecurity, telecommunications, automotive engineering, artificial intelligence also actively hire Mechatronics specialists for their vast expertise and tech-savvy skillset.

Robotics paving the way for automation-related career prospects

On the other hand, robotics engineering primarily deals with the designing, production, application, and operation of robots. It stands at the intersection of electrical, mechanical, and computer engineering, and the robotics-centric courses offer knowledge of mechanisms, kinematics, dynamics, control systems, and electrical and software engineering. These courses also cover electro-mechanics, robotics sensors and instrumentation, robotics fabrication, artificial intelligence, and robotics vision.

Robotics as a plausible career opportunity garner attention and popularity since this technology is being leveraged increasingly in space exploration, power plant maintenance, the automobile industry, etc. Going ahead with this field, one can explore career options in micro-robotics, automation, digital electronics and microprocessors, medical robotics, signal processing, along with robot manipulators, robot motion planning, and computer-aided manufacturing markets. With a background in robotics, the specialists can work in the job profiles of automation system engineers, robotics programmers, robotics technicians, automated product design engineers, robotics testers, robotics system engineers, etc.

Growth avenues in Mechatronics and Robotics

Both the fields of mechatronics and robotics come with vast knowledge and hands-on learning that help shape the students creatively and techie fashion. They offer high-end courses ranging from advanced manufacturing, autonomous robotic intelligent systems, design engineering to engineering management for process excellence and automation. The jobs in these sectors are highly full-filling and satisfying be in terms of quality of work or the pay scale. These are some of the high-impact jobs in the market in the present times and prepare the students and hone the expertise of the professionals, thereby upskilling and reskilling them for future employment.

They are one-of-a-kind courses available globally and are gradually growing to be renowned career prospects both at the domestic and global levels. These courses ensure the holistic development of the learners by extending the perfect balance of extensive knowledge, practical-based learning, along first-hand industry exposure and soft skills training. They lead to the production of future-ready industry professionals who are tech-savvy and possess managerial skills, leadership qualities, problem-solving, quick decision-making capacities, and rational thinking abilities.

Summing Up!

Both Mechatronics and Robotics form the very core of present times’ digitally-enabled world. We, as consumers, use various products and services equipped with these technologies. Considering the digital revolution is picking up pace, these high-end tech solutions and jobs will increasingly occupy a prominent position in the industry.

One of the primary reasons students opt for these courses is because they provide a plethora of job opportunities and various growth avenues. They can scout for career prospects in Research and Development or specific technology departments, top-notch industries, or even tech industry giants. Catering to the talent-skill gap, these new-age fields seem to be growing significantly. They will savor an essential and irreplaceable position in the technology industry in the times ahead. Hence, an increased number of students should and will opt for courses in these advanced technologies to have a secure and bright future and have a competitive edge in the hiring market.