Bain Capital Ventures joins Vention’s previous investors White Star Capital, Bolt, and Real Ventures. With this new investment, Vention will accelerate the development of its cloud-based MachineBuilder 3D software, expand its modular hardware library, and bring the next wave of plug-and-play factory automation solutions to market.
Vention is radically changing the way companies design and order custom equipment for their operations. Traditional design-to-build workflows for custom equipment take anywhere from one to six months, depending on the project’s complexity. Vention’s modular components and easy-to-use cloud platform enable those same workflows to be completed in as little as three days, including shipping (which is offered next-day throughout North America).
Vention’s second major platform release focuses on the user experience, integrating hundreds of new features such as smart part connections, comprehensive design collaboration tools, and a machine learning algorithm that predicts the next parts needed in a design. It also includes 200 new modular components that cover a broad array of use cases in automated equipment, robot cells, tooling, and conveyors applications.
Vention continues its rapid growth trajectory with 600% year-over-year growth. Today, the company serves several hundred clients and thousands of users in a variety of industries, including robotics, aerospace, and automobiles. Vention is also the first and only combined software and hardware platform certified by Universal Robots, and it maintains partnerships with Thomson Industries, Interroll, and PolyAlto.
“Building a large-scale industrial business takes a special breed of investor. We are excited to partner with Bain Capital Ventures, which has a long track record in our industry,” says Étienne Lacroix, Vention’s founder and CEO. “Working with Bain Capital Ventures also means we’re bringing an investor on board with a deep understanding of our manufacturing clients’ needs”
On behalf of Bain Capital Ventures, Managing Partner, Ajay Agarwal notes “As an active investor in robotics and automation, we’ve witnessed the convergence of collaborative robotics, increasing automation, and a growing need for speed and agility in today’s modern manufacturing world.” That’s what makes this investment such a great fit, according to Agarwal. “Etienne and his team have developed a simple and flexible product that’s being adopted at a rapid clip. The company couldn’t be in a stronger position to seize an enormous market opportunity, and we’re excited to help Vention become a leader in the industrial equipment category.”
AMT
Manufacturing technology orders up 22% through November 2018
Confidence for continued growth comes as medical equipment demand grows from a graying of N. America; aerospace industry ramps up on backlogs.
McLean, Virginia – Manufacturing technology orders were $458 million in November, down 2% from October levels and up 7% from November 2017 numbers. October through December orders levels are running significantly higher than the fourth quarter of 2017 but not at the frenetic pace set by third-quarter 2018 order values. The $5 billion year-to-date sum is up an impressive 22% from the same 11 months in 2017.
“Orders in the third quarter were amazing, and no one expected that pace to continue into the last three months of 2018,” says AMT President Doug Woods. “The single-digit October and November year-over-year growth rates are a harbinger of what we’ll see in early 2019, but our members are confident growth will continue as the aerospace industry ramps up to reduce order backlogs; medical equipment demand grows with the graying of North America; and the auto sector drives capex investment deeper into the supply chain.”
The strength in November orders was the product of two sectors – contract machining and industrial machinery. October and November levels in the aerospace and automotive industries provided a strong base for order levels in both months but jumps in demand for manufacturing technology in the contract machining and industrial machinery industries accounted for a significant portion of the year-over-year growth in total orders. November industrial machinery orders were a third larger than October. Forging and stamping also had a good November, up 25% in November after a 75% increase from September to October.
Geographically, the North East, West, and North Central East showed strengthening markets during November. The North Central East growth in orders during November was led by stronger auto and aerospace orders, bucking the national trend in these two sectors. Improvement in the West region was driven by several large orders in the consumer electronics industry. The North East saw the largest month-to-month gain for a region due to a strong pick- up in orders from the contract machining sector and growth in the aerospace sector counter to the national trend in aerospace.
Most of the key indicators are very strong. Consumer confidence moved upwards to 98.3 in December from 97.5 in November, and the sales indices available were stable, including light vehicle sales which posted sales at a 17.4 million units-per-year pace for November. The Institute for Supply Management’s Purchasing Managers’ Index slipped five points from November to December but is still in the expansion range for manufacturing. Several other leading indicators used to gauge the health and direction of the manufacturing technology market are unavailable due to the U.S. government shut down.
Logo from PCI website
PCI scholarship applications now being accepted
The Powder Coating Institute is accepting applications for its 2019 PCI Scholarship Program.
Independence, Kentucky – The Powder Coating Institute (PCI)’s 2019 PCI Scholarship Program is now open and accepting applications. Designed to award students studying in areas that advance powder coating technologies, the program includes the PCI General Scholarship, and three corporate member-sponsored scholarships: PCI/Axalta Scholarship, PCI/Gema Scholarship and the PCI/Nordson Ken Kreeger Scholarship.
To qualify, a candidate must:
Be enrolled in chemistry, polymer science, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, corrosion engineering, manufacturing technologies or similar technical disciplines, as well as sales/marketing and business management. The area of study must be useful for a career in the powder coating industry.
Be enrolled in an accredited two- or four-year technical school, four-year university, or graduate program that offers degrees that can service the powder coating industry.
Be a citizen or permanent resident of the United States, Canada, or Mexico.
Maintain a grade point average of 2.5 or above.
Complete a PCI Scholarship application and attach the following required documents with the application by the deadline:
Completed application
Transcript
Letter of recommendation from a faculty member or advisor
Birth certificate or green card showing proof of citizenship or permanent residency
Special consideration will be given to applicants that demonstrate an interest or previous experience in powder coatings.
Candidates must complete the online application and submit supporting documents by March 15, 2019. Interested applicants should go to https://www.powdercoating.org/page/Scholarship to submit the required information. Scholarship winners will be notified in May and will be asked to provide one brief follow-up summary of educational experiences during the 2019-2020 academic year.
The PCI Scholarship Subcommittee reviews the applications and awards scholarships based on the following set of criteria, established and approved by the PCI Board of Directors:
Specific studies and projects related to powder coatings
Future goals & career objectives
Unique qualifications/goals/aspirations
Letter of recommendation
Grade point average
Representatives from Axalta Coating Systems, Gema USA, and Nordson Corp. will be a part of the selection process for each of their respective scholarships. Scholarships will be awarded in April and presented at PCI’s Annual Meeting in June at the Sonesta Resort in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.
We are truly excited that each year in the number of applicants considered for our scholarship program increases, says PCI Executive Director Trena Benson. “Again, we are thrilled to offer these scholarships for 2019 to help support students who are interested in building a career path in our industry.”
To see previous scholarship award winners and learn more about the program, visit our website.
GE Healthcare, Vanderbilt University Medical Center will use AI-powered apps to help physicians identify the most suitable treatment for each individual patient. Photo: Business Wire
GE Healthcare, Vanderbilt University Medical Center partner
Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered applications will help predict how individual patients will respond to immunotherapies in advance of treatment.
Chicago, Illinois & Nashville, Tennessee – GE Healthcare and Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) announced a five-year partnership to enable safer and more precise cancer immunotherapies. Multiple diagnostic tools will be developed to help predict both the efficacy of an immunotherapy treatment and its adverse effects for a specific patient before the therapy is administered. This would allow physicians to better target immunotherapies to the right patients and avoid potentially damaging, ineffective, and costly courses of treatments.
Immunotherapies use the immune system to recognize and attack cancer cells and can be more effective than traditional treatments, but response rates are often low and side effects can be severe1. GE Healthcare and VUMC will retrospectively analyze and correlate the immunotherapy treatment response of thousands of VUMC cancer patients, with their anonymized demographic, genomic, tumor, cellular, proteomic, and imaging data. They will then develop AI-powered apps that draw on this data to help physicians identify the most suitable treatment for each individual patient.
Simultaneously, GE Healthcare and VUMC will develop new positron-emission tomography (PET) imaging tracers, which together with the apps, will help physicians to stratify cancer patients for clinical trials. It currently takes an average of 12 years2 and costs almost $2 billion3 to bring a drug to market. In many cases, inappropriate patients are recruited to participate in immunotherapy trials, incurring unnecessary expense and slowing down approvals of new therapies. It is hoped that the PET tracers will ultimately also be used to monitor the efficacy of immunotherapies in everyday practice.
“Immunotherapy offers tremendous promise but given the current unpredictability of some patients’ reactions to treatments, it is also associated with increased morbidity and cost. This partnership provides the opportunity to leverage strengths of both of our organizations to further personalize cancer care by creating new tools that allow clinicians to more accurately predict how patients will respond to a specific therapy,” says Jeff Balser, MD, PhD, president and CEO, Vanderbilt University Medical Center and dean of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
“GE Healthcare and Vanderbilt will combine their data science, genomic, imaging and cellular analysis capabilities to help improve clinical decision making. This partnership is a great example of the increasing convergence of the tools, technologies, and data used by therapy innovators and healthcare providers,” says Kieran Murphy, president and CEO, GE Healthcare.
GE Healthcare and the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, a world-renowned stem cell transplant facility, will also collaborate on methods to improve productivity, efficiency, and cost of stem cell transplant processing operations by automating processes, digitizing workflows, improving throughput, and industrializing operations.
The first analytics application prototype will be available by the end of 2019 and the PET tracer proof-of-concept by the end of 2020.
At the start of the EMO exhibition year, DMG MORI will be presenting 70 high-tech machines, 20 of them with automation and the world premieres of the
DMP 70 and Lasertec 125 Shape, at its open house event at Deckel Maho in Pfronten, Germany, January 22-26, 2019. The future-orientated focus topics include digitalization for production and service, integrated automation solutions for competitive manufacturing, and additive manufacturing.
DMP 70 dynamicproduction machine DMG MORI’s DMP 70 is a compact production machine with a footprint of 4.2m², and is ideal for medical technology applications, job shop, aerospace, and more. Traveling paths of 700mm x 420mm x 380mm offer space for a range of components, offers traverse speeds of up to 60m/min, acceleration to 2g, and tool change chip-to-chip time of 1.5 seconds. The tool magazine has space for up to 25 tools. A one-piece machine bed made of cast iron, direct absolute travel measuring systems, and optimal cooling system ensure precision. Automation solutions such as the workpiece handling WH 3 cell, which the DMP 70 is presented with at the open house, can be connected from the right, left, or the front.
Lasertec 125 Shape The Lasertec 125 Shape has been designed for surface structuring of large molds up to 1,250mm x 700mm and workpiece weights of up to a maximum of 2,600kg. The optional high-speed Z-shifter increases travel speed in the Z-direction from 1.5m/s to4m/s, while the laser achieves a pulse rate of up to 1,000kHz. Texture quality has been optimized while maintaining the high process speeds, resulting in up to 69% shorter process times and significantly lower costs per component.
Integrated digitization DMG MORI will present pathways towards networked production – integrated digitization – offering visitors a 45-minute Digital Pfronten Tour where digital products and solutions for integrated digitalization will be presented. DMG MORI will be presenting Production Planning at five stations for workforce planning at Deckel Maho Pfronten and a fully integrated production planning and control system and the Preparation & Production area for the digital process of manufacturing a mold insert – from job scheduling using a CAD/CAM system (Siemens NX) and CELOS PC version through to production on the DMC 1850 V with CELOS Version 5. After a Digitization Show of the entire value-added chain, the tour will end with Monitoring with the DMG MORI Messenger, Condition Analyzer, Performance Monitor and Production Cockpit and, in the area of service & maintenance, with WERKBLiQ. The web-based and multi-vendor platform makes it possible to manage the maintenance of a total of eight 5-axis milling machining centers and three universal surface grinding machines in mechanical manufacturing and the 17 milling machining centers in the technology center at Deckel Maho Pfronten. Benefits of the direct service support with the NETservice, including the SERVICEcamera, will be demonstrated.
Automation Automated machines are crucial components of a digital factory and an integral part of Industry 4.0. The DMG MORI HEITEC joint venture supports DMG MORI in the development and realization of flexible automation solutions, such as workpiece handling, and the expertise is integrated into the production plants of DMG MORI. The interplay between engineering from the DMG MORI production plants and automation expertise on the part of DMG MORI HEITEC provides users with a customized, integrated, reliable solution.
Current examples of DMG MORI’s automation offerings are the Robo2Go 2nd Generation for flexible workpiece handling on lathes and the wide range of pallet handling systems. A PH 150 with up to 12 pallets and a maximum load capacity of 250kg will be shown on a DMU 65 monoBLOCK. A DMU 85 monoBLOCK is presented by DMG MORI with the new PH 400 is a pallet automation system for loading large workpieces up to 800kg for DMU machines and is also available for the DMU 80 P duoBLOCK and DMU 90 P duoBLOCK for palettes up to a weight of 800kg.
Additive manufacturing DMG MORI combines its additive machines from the Lasertec 3D and Lasertec SLM series with machining centers from its machine portfolio. The continuous further development of additive manufacturing (AM) is demonstrated by the Lasertec 12 SLM and Optomet software, while the DMG MORI Academy complements the service range with a consultancy approach that is specially tailored for the AM sector.
With a focus diameter of just 35µm, the Lasertec 12 SLM is four times more precise than the current industry standard. This allows a significantly finer structure resolution, which in turn makes thinner wall thicknesses possible. At the same time, the powder bed machine offers a construction volume of 125mm x 125mm x 200mm, which is unique for this precision class. The Stealth Design and rePLUG powder module – familiar from the Lasertec 30 SLM 2nd generation for material changes in less than two hours – deliver process automation and work safety.
With a 30% share in the Indian software developer, Intech, DMG MORI has opened up access to important software and technology know-how for generative production. As a pioneer in the area of 3D printing in India, the company has specialized in AM and the associated software solutions – including artificial intelligence (AI). One of the initial results of this cooperation is the new Optomet software, which Intech offers for the DMG MORI Lasertec SLM series. It automatically calculates the optimal process parameters. This simplifies programming and leads to significantly improved surface qualities and reproducible material properties.
Technology excellence The DMG MORI Aerospace Excellence Center at Deckel Maho Pfronten develops optimal and integral manufacturing solutions in the aerospace sector. DMG MORI has more than 20 years of technology experience ranging from complex 5-axis simultaneous milling through complete machining using milling-turning technology including the integration of grinding and Ultrasonic milling. Highlights of the DMG MORI Aerospace Excellence Center are the industry-typical applications such as e.g. an angular head resolution for housing production on a DMU 125 FD duoBLOCK. Here the front tools can be automatically changed. The sensor-controlled Tool Control Center (TCC) on a DMC 65 monoBLOCK ensures greater process reliability, allowing you to react swiftly to unplanned tool wear so that the workpiece and machines can be protected from damage.
Projects in the DMG MORI Die & Mold Excellence Center focus on a range of workpieces – from 10mm punches up to 6,000mm workpiece molds, which all find sufficient space in the XXL machining center. The presentation in this area is the DMU 600 P with double table. The DMG MORI Technology Cycle VCS Complete on the DMC 85 monoBLOCK supports good accuracy. Moreover, DMG MORI can guarantee surfaces of up to 0.15µm with reliably accurate linear drives, measuring systems by Magnescale and speedMASTER spindles with up to 30,000rpm and HSC spindles with 60,000rpm.
DMQP The highest machine performance and the best-possible component quality can only be achieved with coordinated and certified technology and peripheral components. DMG MORI thus defines its high demand on quality within the scope of the DMG MORI Qualified Products (DMQP) program. The supporting pillars of this DMG MORI quality guarantee are the many years of innovation partnerships for peripherals and accessories. DMQP partners have to satisfy the most stringent requirements relating to innovative capacity, technological expertise and quality. Coordinated interfaces, securing connectivity, price maintenance and defined warranty conditions ensure optimal productivity of their manufacturing solutions for DMG MORI customers.
At the same time, DMG MORI has recently begun to offer its customers DMQP certificates. The DMQP certificate offers DMG MORI customers unique benefits – a diverse selection of high-performance tool systems, individually compiled by the DMQP partner experts at exclusive conditions.
