Articles and News

The OMAC HMI Working Group organized a joint project between Boeing, Okuma and NIST to evaluate the integration of CNC to ERP and determine if part accountability could be achieved with minimal integration efforts using OPC/OMAC technologies.

In this role, Boie will be responsible for providing a strategic vision to the sales and marketing leadership team and will lead the attainment of profitable new machinery revenue growth.

Bosch Rexroth AG increased sales in 2006 by 7.1 percent to approximately $6.2 billion (4.9 billion Euros). Sales grew 16 percent in Middle and Eastern Europe and 14 percent in Asia, including 33 percent growth in China. Sales in North and South America declined slightly in a difficult economic environment.

IBS has purchased sixteen Adept Cobra i600 SCARA robots which will be used to build an automation line for high speed assembly of a class II medical device for a major international customer.

Strong economic activity in Asia is spurring the growth of manufacturing, which in turn is propelling the growth of the automation market in the region. The Asian market for Distributed Control Systems (DCS) is expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.0% over the next five years, according to a new ARC Advisory Group study.

A committee of industry leaders and academia met at ISA headquarters to begin work on the learning objectives for an automation engineering curriculum for universities. "Our goal is to develop curriculum content for a 4-year automation engineering degree program," said committee chair Randy Buchanan of the University of Southern Mississippi.

According to the study, 83% of respondents had outsourced some or all of NPD activity, confirming that outsourcing of core product development is extremely important in today’s market.

The service offers customers mechanical design, simulation, robot programming and vision guidance for racking and unracking applications.

FANUC received SsangYong Motor Company’s Supplier Appreciation Award for the development of an automated paint system installed in 2006.

Shepherd's responsibilities will include the company's operations including engineering, sales, marketing, and customer service for the United States of America. Prior to joining KUKA Robotics, Mr. Shepherd was founder and president of Shepherd Solutions, a business development and management consulting firm.

The Web site, "Manufacturing is Cool," was created by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) Education Foundation with the goal of inspiring pre-teens and teens to pursue careers in engineering and manufacturing. It provides an inside look at how kid favorites - such as snacks, fashion, cars and cell phones - are designed and produced by engineers.

UK's Defence Aviation Repair Agency (DARA) upgraded its facility for the storage of parts and tools involved in the servicing of RAF and naval aircraft with 11 Lean-Lift automated vertical lift storage systems.

Kuka Robotics has been selected by Transbotics Corporation to provide robotics to work with a new line of Automatic Guided Vehicles (AGV). The robots and AGVs streamline material handling processes for manufacturers by offering a complete solution for material handling from receiving to production to shipping.

The worldwide market for servo drives is expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.6% over the next five years. The market was $3.07 billion in 2005 and is forecasted to be over $3.839 billion in 2010, according to an ARC Advisory Group study.

FKI Logistex,completed a $10.8 million project with Internet shoe and apparel retailer, Zappos.com, to supply an automated material handling system for its new Shepherdsville, Kentucky distribution center (DC).

Adept has been selected by a major Prescription Benefit Management (PBM) Provider as the robotics supplier for its automated distribution center. Cobra i800 robots will be employed as intelligent handlers used in sorting and filling orders for prescription drugs destined for the expanding home delivery market.

Rimrock Corporation, New Berlin, WI, will use the KUKA KR 60 robot in its RoboRouter 200 automated routing, cutting, and trimming system. It uses the KUKA robot inverted and mounted to a Güdel TrackMotion system providing a reliable and cost effective alternative to manual or CNC router operations.

Adept has signed an agreement with Fundacion Fatronik for exclusive supply, distribution and service of a high speed packaging robot mechanism based on the four parallel arm concept. Fatronik will provide Adept with exclusive use of the technology. and both will fund commercialization of the mechanism.

FANUC won the award for the development of a truck bedliner spray system. The bedliner spray system uses robots to spray special buffer material onto truck beds, which helps prevent cargo from slipping or damaging the beds.

During the quarter just ended, Adept delivered $300,000 in vision-guided robotics to the Solar industry, bringing the installed base, in this sector, to over 75 systems.