Cobots to enhance manufacturing processes for automotive players

June 23, 2022 6:59 pm

Identifying new opportunities and emerging technologies to implement into your business early on goes a long way in gaining a competitive advantage, says Anup Verma, Managing Director, Hexagon Metrology India.

Trends and innovation impacting the automation industry 

Additive manufacturing near production sites, AI-based automated inspections, the use of big data to inform design and production, and human machine interfaces are reinventing the manufacturing processes for automotive players. The push for electric cars and driverless cars is strengthened by advancements in machine learning and IoT. These also enable new business models in shared ownership of vehicles, analytics-driven maintenance, safety improvements, and insurance. Further to this, start-ups and emerging companies develop solutions that enable vehicles to securely communicate and transact over a network. 

Among others, hybrid vehicles, robotics, and automotive sensor technologies will transform the sector as we know it today. Identifying new opportunities and emerging technologies to implement into your business early on goes a long way in gaining a competitive advantage. 

Could you briefly talk about your products and solutions? 

Hexagon has been a leader in delivering smart digital realities that require real time and autonomous data capture, analysis and visualisation. We integrate real-world sensor inputs which combined with software solutions are built to analyse, predict and act to create new and more complete realities that address uncertainty and enable resilient organisations, teams and workflows. 

Our digital reality solutions enable customers to harness the rapidly increasing amounts of data, putting it to work to boost efficiency, productivity, quality and safety across industrial, manufacturing, infrastructure, public sector and mobility applications. 

Hexagon has a unique set of five core competencies critical to fusing the physical and digital worlds and fully connecting and leveraging customers’ data. When leveraged together, they add up to perhaps the most dynamic and powerful use of data in history: The Smart Digital Reality™. It’s what Hexagon aims to deliver with every solution. 

Manufacturing with Industry 4.0/ 5.0 to optimise production in present times of digital adoption

In India, the manufacturing landscape is largely dominated by micro small and medium (MSME) industries. In many such factories, one of the major challenges faced is the lack of awareness about the new smart manufacturing technologies, Industry 4.0 etc. Since challenges are often unique to a particular organisation, they require customised solutions. 

Hexagon got into partnership with CMTI, Bangalore in 2021 to focus on this issue. Hexagon is working with CMTI to establish a Smart Factory Demonstrator with a Digital Twin for Small & Medium Business/ Enterprises with examples relating to CNC machining, sheet metal production and additive manufacturing. Employing Industry 4.0 / Smart Factory platforms, the Smart Factory Demonstrator showcases the latest manufacturing technologies for these industries. 

How does metrology power smarter manufacturing approaches? 

Our CAD CAM (computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing) software portfolio enables manufacturers to generate, manage and optimize CNC machining toolpaths for more efficient production processes. Performing measurements with the same reference throughout all processes—from material reception to processing, assembly, inspection, and shipping—makes it possible to create products that match the design exactly and to guarantee product quality. 

Hexagon’s metrology technologies capture quality data for measurement, positioning and inspection. They are the key bridge between the real and virtual worlds, bringing real-world data into the digital domain to power smarter manufacturing approaches.

Hexagon’s metrology portfolio includes all mainstream sensor technologies and metrology hardware including hand tools, coordinate measuring machines (CMMs), portable measuring arms, laser trackers and 3D optical scanners. We also develop an extensive range of 3D metrology software, CT analysis software and statistical process control (SPC) solutions, enabling manufacturers to easily capture real-world data and gain insights that support better decisions. 

How are your various technologies helping manufacturing companies to pioneer new digitalization strategies? 

Hexagon’s strategy is focused on the rapidly widening gap between the enormous amounts of data being created, and the world’s ability to harness it. Putting data to work to empower an autonomous, sustainable future is in our DNA, enabled by five core competencies; Reality capture; Positioning: Location Intelligence; Design and simulation. As previously mentioned, these core competencies combine in perhaps the most dynamic and powerful use of data in historyThe Smart Digital Reality™. This is what Hexagon aims to deliver with every solution it provides. This is Hexagon’s strategic advantage. Hexagon has two major Enterprise solutions through which the majority of industrial segments are catered with futuristic technologies. 

Industrial Enterprise Solutions

Industrial Enterprise Solutions (IES) includes a world-leading portfolio of metrology solutions incorporating the latest sensor and software technologies for fast and accurate measurements. 

Geospatial Enterprise Solutions 

Geospatial Enterprise Solutions (GES) includes a world leading portfolio of reality-capture sensors from laser scanners, airborne cameras and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) to monitoring equipment, mobile mapping technologies and precise positioning. The sensors are complemented by softwares to create 3D maps and models, which are used for decision-making in a range of software applications, covering areas such as surveying, construction, public safety, mining and agriculture. 

What are some of the new age innovations being developed by Hexagon? 

Sensor solutions involve reality capture ad positioning, a category we’ve led for the past two decades. Design & simulation and location intelligence lead our software solutions. They are used to unlock the value of captured data and enable the ability to design, simulate and provide location intelligence for real world scenarios even before they’re built or occur. Our autonomous technologies add the power of machine learning, AI and edge computing, integrating learning and decision-making into any system to deliver solutions that adapt to dynamic environments and evolve as environments change (i.e., get smarter over time). 

Among these, some of our new innovations are the industry first handheld picture-perfect imaging solutions, on site scanning and edge computation solution and ground-penetrating radar solutions which are disrupting the entire industry. These innovations are carried out at Hexagon’s Capability Center India (HCCI), the single largest R&D hub of Hexagon worldwide