by Gary Mintchell | Feb 9, 2024 | Automation, Robots, Software
Robotic systems provide as much news as AI and cybersecurity over the past year. This news regards funding. I don’t follow the whole VC arena closely, but having been in entrepreneurial start-up mode a few times in my life, I know well the value of the life blood of money.
Naturally, this news combines AI and robotic software solutions. Might as well hit two trends at once. Xaba, a Toronto based developer of AI-powered cognitive software to automate programming and deployment of robotics and CNC machines, has announced it has raised US$2 million in a seed extension round of funding to bring to market AI-driven fabrication processes and intelligent autonomous machines.
It says the funding will enable it to democratize robotic automation and drive sustainable manufacturing.
The funding round was led by BDC Capital’s Deep Tech Venture Fund with participation from Hitachi Ventures and existing investor Hazelview Ventures. The investment will be used to establish and staff a new robotics lab and accelerate the delivery of two Xaba manufacturing platforms.
Xaba is augmenting industrial robots and cobots with xCognition, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered software solution. xCognition leverages innovative proprietary machine learning algorithms to model the elasto-mechanical-dynamic behavior of industrial robotics and cobots, as well as workpiece variances. This includes variances in location and shape, using proprietary rule-based language models to eliminate coding of robotics programs. xCognition solves the challenges of deploying industrial robots by completely automating how they are programmed and adopted. This solution not only increases accuracy, consistency, and throughput, but also significantly reduces the time and costs of robotics deployments.
Xaba has two manufacturing platforms – xCognition and xTrude – which use proprietary, state-of-the-art industrial artificial intelligence (AI) to provide AI-powered cognitive industrial automation, consistency, robustness and high execution quality. Its platforms eliminate the need for constant human supervision, reprogramming, and waste – factors that significantly impact the return on investment of any major manufacturing or construction process.
xCognition is Xaba’s AI-powered software solution. This industrial robotics digital twin captures and models the true physics of any industrial robotics system (elastic, dynamic, mechanical, tooling). This includes workpiece variances both in location and shape, leveraging rules-based language models and multi-modal datasets that capture legacy data and best practices to enable any robotics system to execute tasks such as drilling, welding (MIG, TIG & Laser), assembling, riveting, laser, data acquisition, and more with maximum accuracy, repeatability, and minimum human supervision.
by Gary Mintchell | Jan 16, 2024 | Business, News, Software
While I am on a Siemens run, here is recent news about a collaboration with Amazon Web Services. Collaborations are the second way large companies in our market are growing, innovating, and expanding. This one uses GenerativeAI to assist software development.
- Siemens to integrate Amazon Bedrock into its Mendix low-code development platform to allow customers to create new and upgrade existing applications with the power of generative AI
- Access to Amazon Bedrock’s advanced generative AI technologies will help customers accelerate digitalization and tackle skilled labor shortages
- Mendix is an industry leader in low-code development with 50M end-users and more than 200,000 applications running on AWS across industrial, finance and other sectors
Siemens and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are strengthening their partnership and making it easier for businesses of all sizes and industries to build and scale generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Domain experts in fields such as engineering and manufacturing, as well as logistics, insurance or banking will be able to create new and upgrade existing applications with the most advanced generative AI technology. To make this possible, Siemens is integrating Amazon Bedrock – a service that offers a choice of high-performing foundation models from leading AI companies via a single API, along with security, privacy, and responsible AI capabilities – with Mendix, the leading low-code platform that is part of the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio.
The combination will enable customers to select the generative AI model that best suits their specific use case and quickly and securely incorporate that model into their applications. This will make their development simpler, faster, and more efficient. Previously, when developers wanted to integrate generative AI models, they had to obtain access credentials, and write specialized function code. With the new Mendix-Amazon Bedrock integration, this can now be done with just a few clicks. Teams can create smart, industry-hardened applications without dedicated programming knowledge and users can interact with information easily via a graphical interface and the simplicity of a drag and drop commands.
This innovation allows Mendix customers to apply generative AI to drive productivity within their workforce. For instance, using generative AI, a factory worker can find machine documentation faster, generating relevant visualizations without a need to manually search a database, manuals, and records. A production engineer could also use generative AI to suggest machine adjustments to improve yield, and get suggestions on equipment adjustments, maintenance, or even spare parts to maximize a factory’s productivity. Customers do not need to build their own AI infrastructure and will be able to harness the power of their company’s data with the highest possible security and privacy, maintaining full control of their data.
Generative AI technology can supercharge applications with features like summarizing and analyzing lengthy technical or legal documents, translating content into different languages, or recognizing images. Financial businesses can integrate automatic fraud detection in their software, while workers in a car factory can improve quality based on AI analysis of millions of data points in the manufacturing line. With access to a choice of foundational models on Amazon Bedrock, users can easily select the best model for their specific task and integrate it with just a few clicks.
The collaboration expands on the long-established partnership between AWS and Siemens to help streamline the use of IT and cloud technology so it can be easily integrated in applications and machine workflows, making it seamless to engage with.
Today, more than 50 million end users worldwide work with more than 200,000 applications built with Mendix’s low-code platform, available as part of the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio. Low-code platforms are expected to grow substantially over the next years. The technology enables developers to create applications by drag and drop with reusable components and software building blocks, which means they can build more software faster and with smaller teams.
Amazon Bedrock is a fully managed service that offers easy access to a choice of industry-leading large language models and other foundation models from AI21 Labs, Amazon, Anthropic, Cohere, Meta, and Stability AI, along with a broad set of capabilities that customers need to build generative AI applications—simplifying development while supporting privacy and security. Users can also apply Guardrails to filter undesired content, adhere to responsible AI policies, or finetune their models using Knowledge Bases for Amazon Bedrock to give contextual information from private data sources and more relevant, accurate, and customized responses. The Mendix-Amazon Bedrock integration complements AWS’s other generative AI services, like Amazon CodeWhisperer, a machine learning (ML)–powered service that helps improve developer productivity by generating code recommendations based on developers’ comments in natural language and their code. Together, the services extend the benefits of generative AI to developers and enterprise users regardless of their programming abilities.
by Gary Mintchell | Dec 19, 2023 | Enterprise IT, Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
Once upon a time surveys were the purview of analyst firms and media. None were mathematically rigorous. Most do show trends and yield ideas for thought.
Digital transformation is top of mind for companies who develop and market software solutions but maybe not so much for customers. This survey is from iBase-t. I knew them as an MES supplier, but now the are the company “that simplifies how complex products are built and maintained.” In other words, MES. That’s OK. My background in that application goes back decades.
This original survey of more than 100 discrete manufacturing executives in the U.S. found that a lack of a clearly defined roadmap is the biggest challenge for manufacturers looking to digitally transform their operations.
None of this surprises me. Many studies have found similar statistics. Upper management in manufacturing organizations “know” these problems. They don’t seem to know how to go about implementing solutions. Or, they don’t want to spend the money!
In brief, their study revealed:
- 60% of manufacturers don’t have a clear understanding of the model-based enterprise
- 67% of manufacturers say that less than half their operations are digital
A full 60% of respondents said they did not have a clear understanding of the model-based enterprise (MBE), which employs CAD systems, Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems and Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) to help manufacturers fully digitize their operations.
Respondents confirmed that although paperless manufacturing and digital transformation are very important priorities, more than two-thirds (67%) of manufacturers reported that less than half of their operations are digital.
The survey found that more than half (54.5%) of respondents lack the interoperability across operations to adopt an MBE strategy. An additional 55% said that their manufacturing systems are not mature enough to support MBE.
Other Key findings:
- According to the survey, 62% of total respondents said that they believe paperless manufacturing is “very important” to their organization.
- The top four goals for manufacturers heading into 2024 are efficiency (66%), on-time delivery (66%), done-right first time (49%) and profitability (47%). An MBE strategy empowers manufacturers to reach all of these goals.
by Gary Mintchell | Dec 7, 2023 | Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
I found this an interesting survey from Control Engineering (CFE Media). It ran a survey of its readers about SCADA. They received 135 responses from the USA. Some of the results were surprising. It should be noted that this survey is not statistically valid. It’s the opinions of those who cared to respond. Most were from the East Coast. (Thank you graduate school course on running statistically valid surveys which are definitely not run by journalists.)
Responding to “SCADA helps you to…” most responses were operational—maintenance and uptime. Not so many responded Industry 4.0 or IIoT.
Whose SCADA software do you use?
- Siemens
- Emerson and GE Digital (tied)
- Inductive Automation
- AVEVA (Wonderware?)
- Advantech (hardware?)
- Mitsubishi (Iconics)
- 45 of the 135 picked Other.
Rockwell Automation didn’t get enough responses to get its own line on the graph.
Who would you prefer?
When asked who would you like to use Inductive Automation grew to second. Everyone else slipped. GE Digital slipping the most.
- Siemens
- Inductive Automation
- Emerson
- GE Digital
- AVEVA
- Advantech
- Mitsubishi (Iconics)
I am not surprised at the growing preference for Inductive Automation. They have a solid product and the pricing model is outstanding. But given that Siemens has never been able to provide much competition for Rockwell Automation in the USA for control, how is it that its SCADA product leads the pack? Interesting.
by Gary Mintchell | Dec 1, 2023 | Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
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The headline of this article comes from a survey conducted by MES solution provider Parsec Automation Corp. The company spent several months surveying 530 manufacturing professionals in the United States and Canada. Every security company I know does surveys. These are becoming quite a popular marketing tool.
I’m interested partly because I wonder how much talk about digital transformation is simply marketing hype and how much refers to real work. I’ve concluded that although manufacturers in general have digitized many sources of data they mostly fall short of gathering sufficient data from important sources and using that data intelligently in order to make better decisions.
This survey suggests as much.
Survey Highlights:
- Manufacturers are pleased with digital transformation but may need to go further, as 31% of “fully transformed” companies still collect most of their data using manual processes.
- Supply chain issues remain top of mind, with 53% of manufacturers saying their organizations are “hardly” or “somewhat” prepared to weather a storm.
- Manufacturers anticipate using AI/ML, but just one-third (34%) feel their businesses are prepared to leverage this advanced technology.
- MES (manufacturing execution system) technology is facing a knowledge gap, with 75% of manufacturers who report being familiar with—but not yet using MES—saying they don’t know how the technology would benefit their operations.
One telling thing is the lack of knowledge about the benefits of MES. MESA, the trade association, has been working alongside both solution providers and active users for many years to promote the benefits of the technology. Trainers told me 15 years ago that the greatest interest came from manufacturers in Asia followed by Europe. They had trouble filling classes in North America. This survey of manufacturers in North America seems to confirm what my current sources tell me—we are still falling behind over here.
Overall, nearly three-quarters (73%) of manufacturers have begun the digital transformation process, with 40% reporting significant progress or completion. However, more than one-third (35%) still report relying on paper-based data collection, which suggests a significant gap among manufacturers’ willingness and preparedness to embrace today’s technology.
“Although manufacturers are steadily advancing towards digital transformation, there remains a significant scope for progress,” commented Eddy Azad, Founder and CEO of Parsec. “It’s heartening to note that over half (53%) of the survey participants are utilizing enabling technologies like MES. This insight underscores the need for technology providers to not only effectively showcase the benefits of their solutions, but also to furnish the requisite tools and education for the seamless and sustainable adoption of these transformative technologies.”
In perhaps the understatement of the report, Parsec’s survey findings suggest that manufacturers may be underutilizing technology or underestimating its capabilities. Among the respondents whose companies have reportedly “completed” their digital transformations, nearly one-third (31%) still collect most or all of their data using non-digital processes.
When it comes to MES platforms, which leverage IIoT technologies to automate and optimize nearly every facet of manufacturing operations—from receipt of raw materials, through production, to shipping, warehousing, and distribution—more than one-quarter (27%) of respondents said they had never heard of MES before.
All is not lost, though:
Those who have adopted MES, however, are pleased with their results. An impressive three-quarters (75%) of respondents who are actively utilizing an MES platform said they were “very” or “extremely satisfied” with the product. These active users said they adopted the advanced technology to increase efficiency (73%), improve quality (57%), and reduce operating costs (47%).
I’ve become increasing interested in the power of various AI technologies. Here the report agrees.
Across the industry, manufacturers are keenly aware of the trajectory of today’s technology, with more than half (52%) agreeing that enterprise software solutions should include capabilities for AI and ML.
At the same time, just one-third (34%) feel their business is prepared to leverage this advanced technology. When asked about the barriers standing in their way, respondents cited lack of knowledge (46%), lack of trust in the technology (39%) and implementation costs (33%).
“Manufacturers need to adopt advanced technology to propel the industry forward,” Azad elaborated. “Contemporary software solutions must be developed with enhanced accessibility and exceptional user experience in mind. It is imperative for technology providers to proactively engage with manufacturers, address their apprehensions, and offer guidance to fuel their success.”
Parsec is the developer of TrakSYS, a proven operations management software application and solution platform designed to significantly improve manufacturing processes. Parsec is committed to providing best-in-class products and solutions to our worldwide community of clients to assist them in optimizing their manufacturing operations. There are thousands of TrakSYS licenses in use around the globe in a wide variety of Industries.
by Gary Mintchell | Nov 28, 2023 | Cloud, Edge, Operations Management, Software
Containers, specifically Kubernetes, constitute a powerful tool in the modern edge-to-cloud architecture, ZEDEDA has developed a service model for the technology.
In brief:
- ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service is a fully managed service including a Kubernetes runtime curated, managed and supported by ZEDEDA.
- Organizations can instantly deploy Kubernetes infrastructure at the distributed edge, securely and cost-efficiently.
- ZEDEDA’s partnerships and integrations with industry-leading orchestrators, such as Avassa, Rafay, Red Hat OpenShift, SUSE Rancher and VMware Tanzu, provide a robust solution for the modern edge landscape.
ZEDEDA has announced ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service, a fully managed Kubernetes service for the distributed edge. The new service includes a Kubernetes runtime that is curated, managed and supported by ZEDEDA, as well as integrations with industry-leading orchestrators.
Deploying Kubernetes at the edge is challenging because it was built for centralized data centers and scale-out clouds and, therefore, not for inherently constrained and distributed edge environments. ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service is a fully managed service that simplifies Kubernetes deployments at the edge, allowing customers to focus on their applications instead of managing and maintaining the underlying infrastructure. The new service eliminates the struggles typically associated with Kubernetes deployments at the edge, such as highly remote or distributed locations, constrained devices, unreliable security, lack of skilled IT personnel in the field and undependable network connectivity. ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service enables organizations to deploy and run Kubernetes infrastructure at the distributed edge remotely, securely and cost-efficiently.
“Our customers are industry leaders who are pushing the boundaries of innovation at the distributed edge, and working with them, we realized the need for an edge service that would remove the obstacles of deploying Kubernetes in these environments,” said Said Ouissal, ZEDEDA’s CEO and founder. “ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service is a first-of-its-kind fully managed edge solution that enables our customers to use any Kubernetes tools that fit their needs and provides a clear path to modernize edge infrastructure while leveraging existing IT investments.”
ZEDEDA Edge Kubernetes Service Provides Full Lifecycle-Managed Kubernetes.
