Choosing an end of arm tooling supplier is a bigger decision than choosing a single gripper, because the supplier shapes your lead times, your customization options, and your support for years. This roundup compares the end of arm tooling companies we most often see on shortlists, what each one is genuinely best at, and how to decide between them.
Full transparency before we start: Anubis 3D is one of the companies on this list, because we compete in this market. To keep the comparison useful, we describe every company by its real strengths, and we are equally clear about the applications where a competitor is the better call.
How We Compared EOAT Companies
Five factors separate tooling suppliers in practice: specialization (vacuum, mechanical, or custom), customization depth (catalog only versus tooling designed around your part), lead time for both new tools and revisions, geography and support coverage, and cobot readiness, meaning lightweight tools and plug and play integration. Weight these by your application before reading any vendor page, including ours. For background on the tooling categories themselves, see our complete guide to end of arm tooling.
The Top End of Arm Tooling Companies
Piab (Sweden)
Piab is one of the largest names in vacuum automation, with a deep catalog of suction cups, vacuum pumps and ejectors, and cobot gripping solutions, plus a separate vacuum conveying business. The breadth of standard components and global distribution make Piab a safe default for conventional vacuum applications.
Coval (France)
Coval focuses on intelligent vacuum handling, positioning itself around energy efficient ejectors, IO-Link monitoring, and what it calls vacuum management. It is a strong choice for European packaging lines where compressed air consumption and diagnostics matter as much as grip.
Schunk (Germany)
Schunk is the reference point for mechanical gripping and clamping, with precision parallel, angular, and servo grippers in an enormous standard catalog. For machine tending and metalworking applications built on rigid, repeatable mechanical grip, Schunk is hard to beat.
OnRobot (Denmark)
OnRobot builds plug and play end effectors for collaborative robots, with a unified mechanical and software interface across robot brands. It suits teams that want to deploy a cobot quickly with standard tooling and minimal integration engineering.
Robotiq (Canada)
Robotiq, based in Quebec, is known for cobot grippers and complete application kits, with especially deep roots in the Universal Robots ecosystem. Its palletizing and machine tending solutions bundle hardware and software for fast deployment.
Destaco (United States)
Destaco brings decades of clamping and automation heritage, with robotic tool changers, grippers, and end effector components that grew out of automotive body shop tooling. It fits high volume automotive and heavy industrial programs.
Anubis 3D (Canada)
We take the opposite approach to a standard catalog: every tool is designed around the customer part and 3D printed in PA12 nylon in Mississauga, Ontario. That produces grippers, carton erectors, and robot tooling that weigh 50 to 70 percent less than machined equivalents, match contoured product geometry at no extra cost, and ship revisions in days.
EOAT Companies at a Glance
| Company | HQ | Known For | Customization | Best Fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Piab | Sweden | Vacuum automation and suction cups | Standard catalog, configurable | Conventional vacuum handling at scale |
| Coval | France | Energy efficient vacuum management | Standard catalog, configurable | European packaging lines |
| Schunk | Germany | Mechanical grippers and clamping | Large catalog, some engineered to order | Machine tending, metalworking |
| OnRobot | Denmark | Plug and play cobot end effectors | Standard products | Fast cobot deployments |
| Robotiq | Canada | Cobot grippers and application kits | Standard products | Universal Robots ecosystems |
| Destaco | United States | Tool changers and heavy automation | Catalog plus engineered programs | Automotive, high volume industrial |
| Anubis 3D | Canada | Custom 3D printed EOAT | Fully custom, designed around your part | Part specific, lightweight, fast revision tooling |
When Anubis 3D Is the Right Choice, and When It Is Not
If your application runs on standard suction cups at massive scale, Piab or Coval will serve you well. If you need precision servo grippers for metal parts, start with Schunk. If you want a cobot running tomorrow with off the shelf tooling, OnRobot and Robotiq exist for exactly that.
Choose us when the part is the problem: irregular geometry, porous or delicate surfaces, tight payload budgets, mixed products on one line, or a tool that simply does not exist in any catalog. Custom design plus in house SLS printing means the tool fits the part instead of the other way around, and a design revision is a new print, not a new machining setup. Most of our customers arrive after a catalog component has already failed on their product.
How to Shortlist an EOAT Supplier
Send the same three inputs to every candidate: your part CAD or samples, your robot model, and your cycle time target. Then compare the answers on four points: how much of the tool is designed for your part versus pulled from a catalog, the quoted tooling weight against your payload budget, lead time for the first tool and for a revision, and who supports you when the product changes next year. A supplier who asks detailed questions about your part before quoting is usually the one who will still be useful after commissioning.
Final Thoughts
There is no single best end of arm tooling company, only the best fit for your application, and the honest answer changes with the part in your hand. Use the table above to shortlist two or three suppliers, send each the same inputs, and let the quality of their questions decide. If your part is the difficult kind, we would like to be one of the three.
Ready to Put Us on Your Shortlist?
Tell us about your robot, your product, and your target cycle time, our team will recommend a tooling design that fits your payload, changeover, and budget.
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