The current COVID-19 experiences have energized many conversations about our futures in the post-COVID world, and that includes the future of manufacturing.
Smart manufacturing is now being rapidly adopted by a much wider range of business sectors.
Long gone are the days where the only solution to human error was human correction. As engineers today, we have access to smart technology that no other generation could have ever imagined.
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused major upheavals in manufacturing processes to avoid contamination while keeping supply chains intact.
To get to smart manufacturing, the industry needs integration, simulation and analysis.
In August, Rob Sullivan had an installation scheduled for two of his autonomous mobile robots at the Deutsche Post DHL Group’s Innovation Center in Troisdorf, Germany.
Like the United Nations’ international delegates who use interpreters to understand each other, robots, machines and other industrial components from various vendors speak different computer languages and need translators to help them communicate.
Until 2018, a West Coast manufacturer of gaming headsets and peripherals used approximated mesh CAD/CAM to size parts, tightening tolerance parameters up to 10 times smaller than the standard setting.
Industry 4.0 is often presented as a complex, somewhat overwhelming topic that involves large companies only. However, the data collection and transfer at the heart of Industry 4.0 can be as relevant to job shops and other small to medium sized enterprises as large companies.
LIFT recently expanded the focus of its desire to “create innovations faster, better and cheaper” to the materials, processes and systems involved in moving innovations from concept to commercialization.
