Factory Automation Will Speed Forward with A.I., Says Bernstein
By Tiernan Ray for Barron's: Bernstein Research’s Alberto Moel, who follows tech-industrial companies such as Corning(GLW) and AU Optronics (AUO), this afternoon offered up a thinks piece on robotics andfactory automation, arguing that some of the costs of automation beyond the basic cost of the robot are about to get dramatically cheaper, thanks in large part to artificial intelligence akin to what Alphabet (GOOGL) and others are doing.
Moel notes that the basic components of factory robots are only falling by perhaps 6% per year, their cost reduction bounded by things such as casings and servomotors and reduction gears that don’t rapidly fall in cost.
But, writes Moel, the cost to install and adjust these machines on a factory floor is ten times their component cost and that stuff can be reduced more dramatically:
How much this integration costs varies widely. An often-cited rule of thumb is that a $50,000 robot will need $500,000 of integration costs before it is all said and done. Of course, these integration costs can be amortized over many robots, so perhaps a better estimate would be 3-5x the robot cost [...] But I do believe we are at an inflection pointthat will materially increase the capability of automation systems and substantially reduce programming, setup, and fixturing costs which are the largest cost element in most automation efforts. So instead of a measly 6% YoY cost reduction , we get 25-30% YoY declines, and automation Nirvana. Cont'd.. .
Fetch Robotics Expands Executive Team
Executives from Magellan and Willow Garage Leadership Join Logistics Pioneer
Optical sensing and imaging community readies for SPIE Defense and Commercial Sensing
Topics such as infrared, laser, terahertz, multi- and hyperspectral imaging, fiber-optic sensors, and wireless sensing help to drive innovation in sectors as wide-ranging as process monitoring, surveillance, oil and gas exploration, agriculture and crop optimization, pharmaceuticals, healthcare, homeland defense, terrorism countermeasures, robotics, and the Internet of Things. SPIE Defense and Commercial Sensing will bring the global community together on these topics in April in Baltimore.
Most Popular Articles for 2015 - Did some of them predict the future?
Smart Homes, Robotics, Automation, Unmanned Vehicles, Solar and Wind Energy. Regardless of where you work or what you do, these topics are affecting your life and will continue to do so in the future.
ATX West - Tsugami/Rem Sales to Demonstrate LaserSwiss CNC Machine at MD&M West Show
Tsugami/Rem Sales, the exclusive North American importer of Precision Tsugami CNC machine tools, announced today that it will demonstrate its S206 LaserSwiss machine at the MD&M West show in Anaheim, CA in February.
RoboBusiness 2016 Call for Speakers Now Open
RoboBusiness is currently seeking qualified presenters for the conference program to be offered September 28-29, 2016 at the San Jose Convention Center in San Jose, CA.
Allied Motion Technologies Announces Completion of Heidrive Acquisition
Allied Motion Technologies Inc., a global designer and manufacturer of motion control products, announced today that it has completed the acquisition of Heidrive GmbH, a drive technology and engineering company for €20 million (approximately US$22 million). Allied Motion announced on December 23, 2015 that it had signed an agreement to purchase Heidrive.
Counting Photons…How Low Can You Go?
New program will plumb the fundamental limits of light detection to enable revolutionary new concepts, models and imaging devices
Motor vehicle construction benefiting from new laser joining processes
Lasers help when joining lightweight steel and aluminium structures / Laser welding profitable even with small batch sizes
Stenner Pump Meets Increased Customer Demand with Rethink Robotics' Baxter
Industry-Leading Manufacturer of High-Quality Metering Pumps Uses Smart, Collaborative Robot for Two Tasks at Once
Dremel Fuels Maker Movement in Education With Advanced 3D Printer
Debuting as the brands first device for education, the Dremel 3D Idea Builder empowers students to master key STEM concepts through hands-on learning and creativity
Robotics, reshoring, and American jobs
By Charles Orlowek for The Hill: Good news? Boston Consulting Group foresees more large manufacturers boosting production for the American market by adding capacity in the U.S. itself, compared with any other country. It cites “decreasing costs and improved capabilities of advanced manufacturing technologies such as robotics." Under this optimistic scenario, how much value would American workers add? When robotics and other automation gets built for, and installed in American workplaces, where are jobs created?
Increasingly, these jobs are being created and sustained outside the United States, even for domestic factories.
The first industrial robots were developed and manufactured by Americans, and General Motors became the first user, in 1961. Over recent decades, however, the domestic robot industry has declined. A Commerce Department national security assessment from 1991 asserted that American robot manufacturers lost market share throughout the 1980s, with shipments of U.S.-manufactured robots falling by 33 percent between 1984 and 1989, despite robust domestic demand and a weak dollar. Cont'd...
Opto Diode Introduces Family of Near-Infrared Detectors
Opto Diode Corporation, an ITW company, introduces the NXIR family of photodiodes, designed specifically for back-facet laser-monitoring applications that require improved performance in the near-infrared (NIR) spectrum from 700 nm to 1100 nm.
Sierra-Olympic Offers Unique Vis-SWIR Video Camera - QI-SCD15-M1
• The low-power Vis-SWIR camera will be presented at SPIE Photonics West 2016, Moscone Convention Center, San Francisco, CA, Feb. 16 - 18 in Sierra-Olympics booth # 5340.
Robotics at the Distributed Intelligent Systems Lab at GE Global Research
At GEs Global Research Center, were also looking at the next generation of robotics - drones for aerial-based surveillance and inspection, small scale crawlers for in-situ inspection, and mobile collaborative robotics for things like machine tending in our factories.
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Industrial Robotics - Featured Product
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