Smart Pharmacy System

CobotSys Smart Pharmacy System encompasses over 40 automation products that transform hospital medication management from manual processes to intelligent, zero-contact operations. The platform covers the complete pharmaceutical workflow from outpatient dispensing through inpatient services, IV admixture preparation, and consumable tracking.

Product Overview

Hospital pharmacies in China process enormous medication volumes daily. A typical tertiary hospital handles 5,000 to 8,000 prescriptions per day, translating to approximately 30,000 medication packages requiring accurate dispensing. Traditional semi-automated dispensing machines improved speed but created new bottlenecks—faster dispensing demanded faster restocking, often requiring additional staff without meaningful efficiency gains.

CobotSys approached pharmacy automation differently by integrating its core AI and robotics competencies: 3D vision for medication identification, intelligent grasping for flexible handling, and machine learning for operational optimization. The result is a full system that addresses the entire medication flow rather than isolated tasks.

The zero-contact smart pharmacy solution deployed at Wuhan Union Hospital’s Jinyin Lake Campus in 2021 became Hubei Province’s first fully intelligent pharmacy in a tertiary hospital setting.

Key Features

Certified for MIIT’s healthcare robot excellence list and installed in PLA General Hospital and Tongji Hospital, CobotSys Smart Pharmacy covers over 40 automation products from dispensing through IV admixture.

• Intelligent Dispensing-Replenishment Integration: Combined dispensing and restocking automation eliminates the traditional bottleneck of separate processes
• 3D Vision Recognition: Automated medication identification without requiring pre-programming of each SKU
• Dual-Mode High-Speed Dispensing: Supports both box-level and unit-dose dispensing workflows
• Visual Verification: AI-powered checking system for final dispensing accuracy confirmation
• Unit-Dose Packaging: Compliance-based blister packaging for medication adherence programs

System Components

Outpatient Pharmacy Solutions

Inpatient Pharmacy Solutions

IV Admixture Center (PIVAS)

Clinical Applications

Zero-Contact Pharmacy Operations: During infectious disease outbreaks, the system enables complete medication dispensing without direct patient-pharmacist contact, reducing transmission risk while maintaining service continuity.

Efficiency Enhancement: By automating the most time-consuming tasks—medication retrieval, counting, packaging, and verification—pharmacists can redirect their expertise toward clinical consultation and prescription review.

Error Reduction: Machine vision verification catches dispensing errors that might escape manual checking, improving patient safety.

Inventory Optimization: Real-time tracking and predictive analytics minimize both stockouts and excess inventory, reducing medication waste.

The system has been deployed at major institutions including PLA General Hospital, Peking University Third Hospital, Tongji Hospital, Union Hospital, and Zhongshan Hospital across more than 20 provinces.

Technology Differentiation

Unlike pharmacy automation vendors focused solely on mechanical dispensing, CobotSys built its pharmacy platform on the same AI robotics foundation as its medical devices. This enables several distinctive capabilities:

Flexible Grasping: The system handles diverse medication packaging formats without dedicated fixtures for each product type

Self-Learning: Machine learning algorithms continuously improve recognition accuracy based on operational data

System Integration: Common software architecture across pharmacy, logistics, and clinical robotics enables unified hospital digital transformation

The company’s unit-dose packaging robot broke the monopoly of overseas manufacturers in this segment, offering comparable functionality at reduced cost with domestically-sourced components.

Frequently Asked Questions

What pharmacy operations does the CobotSys system automate?

The Smart Pharmacy System covers four main areas: outpatient dispensing (high-speed medication retrieval and verification), inpatient pharmacy (unit-dose packaging and ward cabinet replenishment), IV admixture preparation (sterile compounding automation), and consumable management (tracking and inventory optimization). The platform includes over 40 individual products that can be deployed independently or as an integrated solution.

How does zero-contact pharmacy work?

The zero-contact pharmacy configuration eliminates direct pharmacist-patient interaction during dispensing. Patients submit prescriptions electronically, automated systems retrieve and package medications, visual AI verifies accuracy, and patients collect medications from designated pickup points. This workflow was validated during the COVID-19 pandemic at Wuhan hospitals and has since been adopted by facilities nationwide.

Which hospitals use CobotSys pharmacy automation?

CobotSys smart pharmacy solutions have been deployed in over 100 hospitals across more than 20 Chinese provinces. Notable installations include PLA General Hospital, Peking University Third Hospital, Wuhan Tongji Hospital, Wuhan Union Hospital, and Shanghai Zhongshan Hospital. The system was selected for the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s list of excellent robot application scenarios in healthcare.