The Digital, Industry and Space sector is a living ecosystem in Europe, where Horizon Europe projects do not work in silos but aim to learn from each other and create synergies that will take their impact to a higher level.
AID4SME is privileged to have been funded alongside five other projects: ROB4GREEN, iBot4CRMs, COSMIC, AEROSUB, and AMALTEA. Together, these projects form a cluster that will focus on creating synergies in exploitation, dissemination, and communication activities, the exchange of knowledge, and overcoming common challenges.
To maximise the visibility of these projects, AID4SME has been working on getting to know them better. As a result, iBot4CRMs project coordinator, Nabil Belbachir, has kindly agreed to an interview to present his project, share how self-learning robotic systems are automatising urban mining to recover Critical Raw Materials, discuss the technical bottlenecks of dismantling complex industrial and electronic waste, and highlight strategic touchpoints where iBot4CRMs and AID4SME can collaborate to drive industrial AI adoption. Don’t miss this insightful piece!
Coordinator profile
Nabil Belbachir has almost three decades of experience with computer vision, AI and robotics, as engineer, scientist, visionary leader and strategist, contributing with sustainable innovative concepts, products and solutions. Nabil Belbachir is a research director at NORCE, director at eu-robotics Aisbl and strategy advisor for ADRA Aisbl and the European Commission, for coordinating European Strategic Research, Innovation and Deployment Agenda and contributing to HEU work programme 2025-2027 in AI, Data and Robotics. He has a PhD (2005) in computer science from TU Vienna (Austria). He edited the single-source Springer book “Smart Cameras (2009)”, translated into Chinese by China Machine Press (2014) and has over 140 scientific publications, 3 patents. Currently, he is coordinating COGNIMAN, and iBot4CRMs, two Horizon Europe Innovation projects on AI-powered robotics, respectively for Flexible Manufacturing and for recovery of Critical Raw Materials from electronic waste. He is also leading the Agder CARM centre developing novel robotics solutions on urban mining.
Could you explain the iBot4CRMs project in a nutshell?
The iBot4CRMs project is a Horizon Europe initiative designed to bolster Europe’s supply security and resilience regarding access to Critical Raw Materials (CRMs). In a nutshell, the project focuses on automatising urban mining by developing advanced, self-learning robotic systems to recover CRMs (e.g., copper) and rare Earth minerals (e.g., Neodymium) from complex urban waste streams. It targets smart automation and robotics to safely and efficiently dismantle complex end-of-life products (like electronic waste and discarded machinery) to extract high-value materials. Furthermore, the project elaborates on harnessing cutting-edge artificial intelligence and computer vision to allow robots to dynamically adapt to varying waste types, recognise components, and optimise sorting workflows. The project directly supports the goals of the European Green Deal and the CRMs Act (CRMA) by decreasing reliance on primary mining and securing secondary material pipelines within Europe.
What are the main technical or regulatory bottlenecks when it comes to identifying, sorting, and recovering Critical Raw Materials (CRMs) in modern industrial waste streams?
Recovering CRMs from modern industrial waste streams faces a difficult combination of engineering hurdles and legislative friction. On the technical side, high material heterogeneity and tight integration mean that valuable elements like neodymium and cobalt are deeply embedded inside multi-material assemblies, while legacy shredding and basic sorting infrastructure inevitably fragment or contaminate these materials. Furthermore, standard sensing and computer vision struggle with hidden components, and traditional industrial robots lack the real-time adaptability required for unstructured dismantling. Therefore, the manual sorting is the only way today for effective dismantling. And this is prohibitive for large waste volumes. On the regulatory side, rigid waste classifications trigger heavy administrative burdens, and complex cross-border transport rules complicate the aggregation of necessary recycling volumes. These hurdles are compounded by a lack of traceability of CRMs, alongside market disincentives where weak mandates for using secondary materials make it difficult for recycled CRMs to compete with primary imports.
How can intelligent robotics and automation lower the economic barriers that currently make CRM recovery less attractive to manufacturers?
Intelligent robotics and automation transform the economics of CRMs recovery, turning what was once a low-margin, high-risk operational burden into a profitable, high-purity supply stream. By automating tedious dismantling tasks, these advanced systems eliminate the prohibitive labour costs and safety liabilities associated with manual sorting in hazardous environments. Instead of relying on bulk shredding that mixes and downcycles valuable materials, AI-powered robots use multi-modal sensing to selectively extract valuable components before shredding occurs, allowing recyclers to command premium prices for uncontaminated, high-purity materials. Furthermore, self-learning AI agents adapt instantly to variable waste streams without requiring manual reprogramming, dramatically reducing plant downtime and maximising throughput. By pairing automated sorting with digital traceability infrastructure, facilities can generate certified quality data that gives manufacturers the confidence to switch from volatile virgin imports to reliable, localised secondary CRM pipelines.
What are the potential opportunities and touchpoints between iBot4CRMs and AID4SME?
While iBot4CRMs focuses on physical robotic hardware and AI-driven sorting to recover CRMs from urban waste, AID4SME bridges the technology gap for SMEs by deploying industrial AI and resource optimisation solutions. The two initiatives intersect across several strategic touchpoints. Specialised SMEs within the AID4SME network can develop modular software, advanced computer vision, or edge-AI algorithms that plug directly into the iBot4CRMs robotic architecture. Furthermore, the robust data collection and analytics frameworks promoted by AID4SME can serve as the telemetry backbone for processing the massive sensory streams generated during automated waste sorting. Finally, the broader Community of Practice built by AID4SME provides a valuable scaling ecosystem, helping commercialise the digital and automation tools developed in iBot4CRMs for wider industrial adoption across European supply chains.