Cutting Blanks and Air Bent Steel

"Don't save me any money, I can't afford it." Tesla Cybertruck manufacturing highlights the importance of supplier collaboration and picking the best. Steel comes back into focus.

David Rogers

Dec 24, 2023

Shop Talk

Capturing this week's zeitgeist

More holiday spirit from Siemens, Edmund Optics, and Coherent!

Assembly Line

This week's most influential Industry 4.0 media.

Tesla Manufacturing: See how the Cybertruck HFS Panels are Blanked, Bent, and Built!

🏢 Organizations: Tesla

Bonus video breakdown at The Autopian and my favorite clip.

Automating Quality Machine Inspection Infused with Edge AI and Digital Twins for Device Monitoring

✍️ Authors: Karunakaran Samuel, Mac Mahalingam, Raju Karuppiah, Chandra Mohan Ravanan
🔖 Topics: Manufacturing Analytics, IT OT Convergence
🏢 Organizations: AWS, Kyndryl

In this post, we will discuss an AI-based solution Kyndryl has built on Amazon Web Services (AWS) to detect pores on the welding process using acoustic data and a custom-built algorithm leveraging voltage data. We’ll describe how Kyndryl collaborated with AWS to design an end-to-end solution for detecting welding pores in a manufacturing plant using AWS analytics services and by enabling digital twins to monitor welding machines effectively.

Kyndryl’s solution flow consists of collecting acoustic data with voltage and current from welding machines, processing and inferencing data at the edge to detect welding pores while providing actionable insights to welding operators. Additionally, data is streamed to the cloud to perform historical analysis and improve operational efficiency and product quality over time. A digital twin is enabled to monitor the welding operation in real-time with warnings created to proactively manage the asset when predefined thresholds are met.

Navigating Green Tech with a Global Manufacturing Network

🏢 Organizations: Fictiv

Tapping AI for Leaner, Greener Semiconductor Fab Operations

✍️ Author: Saumitra Jagdale
🔖 Topics: Production Planning
🏢 Organizations: Flexciton

Flexciton uses a cloud-based hybrid scheduling model whose two key components are a global scheduler and a toolset scheduler. The global scheduler focuses on the broader objective of optimizing the overall manufacturing process at the fab level. It considers the big picture and aims to make decisions that maximize efficiency and productivity across the fab. The toolset scheduler works at a more granular level, focusing on the efficient operation of individual machines or tools within the fab. Its main goal is to ensure that wafers move through the fab machines smoothly and efficiently. It also strives to follow the priority ranking that was determined by the global scheduler.

To ensure that even the slightest changes in a fab element’s operation do not hamper the manufacturing process, Flexciton’s software runs its calculations every 10 minutes for the global scheduler and every three minutes for the toolset scheduler.

Accelerating Automation in Logistics with Simulation - A DHL Case Study

🏢 Organizations: Visual Components, DHL

OPC-UA Cyber Threats Explained: Specifications Vulnerabilities and MITM Risks

🔖 Topics: Cybersecurity, OPC-UA
🏢 Organizations: txOne Networks

Figure 1: PITM (Plant-in-the-Middle) Attack Model

Recent research into the cybersecurity of OPC UA in industrial control systems has revealed shocking vulnerabilities, highlighting an urgent need to strengthen security measures. Many systems utilizing OPC UA are vulnerable, primarily due to flawed implementations of security features such as certificate validation and inadequate Trust List management, issues that persist even among products from leading brands. Numerous products lack essential security features, such as Trust Lists, or have unsafe default configurations. This indicates a significant underestimation of network security threats in industrial control systems, especially those associated with OPC UA.

New Product Introduction

Highlighting new and innovative products and services

Holcim launches Phoenix, the first-of-its-kind circular 3D-printed concrete bridge

📅 Date: December 18, 2023
🏢 Organizations: Holcim, ETH Zurich, incremental3D

Holcim launches Phoenix, the first-of-its-kind 3D-printed concrete masonry bridge built with 10 tons of recycled materials, at its Innovation Hub in Europe. Using its proprietary ECOCycle® circular technology, Holcim developed a custom concrete ink for Phoenix with recycled materials inside. Phoenix demonstrates how circular construction combined with 3D concrete printing can enable low-carbon infrastructure applications. Circular construction, using computational design and 3D printing, allows for a reduction of up to 50% of the materials used with no compromise in performance.

Read more at Informed Infrastructure

Parallel Systems Tests Railcar ‘Platooning’ in California

📅 Date: December 20, 2023
🏭 Vertical: Railroad
🏢 Organizations: Parallel Systems

The individually powered railcars are designed to transport standard shipping containers as a single or double-stacked load in short-haul freight operations, and can form “platoons” of up to 50 cars, according to Parallel Systems.

Industrial Policy

How governments are shaping the future industrial landscape.

🇲🇽 Mexico’s nearshoring wave is years in the making

📅 Date: December 18, 2023
✍️ Authors: Alejandra Salgado, Edwin Lopez

Whether through foreign direct investments or internationally purchased goods, the automotive sector has an outsized share of Mexico’s top trade metrics. In the first three quarters of 2023 alone, motor vehicle manufacturing drew $5.4 billion in foreign direct investments, more than any other full year prior. For example, BMW, which has been in the country for over 30 years, this year announced an $860 million investment to ready its plant in San Luis Potosí for electric vehicle production. Similarly, Tesla has proposed building a gigafactory in Nuevo León.

🇲🇾 Could Malaysia’s semiconductor industry help China?

📅 Date: December 19, 2023
✍️ Author: Aaron Raj

Malaysia currently controls 13% of the global market for packaging, assembly and testing services for semiconductors. It is also the sixth largest source of semiconductor exports in the world. This makes the country an ideal supplier in the semiconductor supply chain, with the US being a major trade partner in the industry too.

According to a report by Nikkei Asia, chip companies Jabil, Micron, Bosch, Western Digital and Lam Research are all expanding their manufacturing footprints in the area around Penang in Malaysia, stretching from Kulim in the north to the Batu Kawan Industrial Park in the south. DHL Express is constructing several logistics centers in the area, after launching direct cargo flights five days a week between Penang and Hong Kong, a chip-trading hub close to mainland China, in mid-2021.

🇨🇳 China's surging steel exports risk new round of trade frictions

📅 Date: December 19, 2023
✍️ Author: Tomio Shida

China is on track to export around 90 million tonnes of steel in 2023, approaching the more than 110 million tonnes of 2015 – a year that saw a proliferation of anti-dumping measures around the world. The problem stems from China’s slumping internal demand for steel, due chiefly to the cooling real estate market. Steel demand has dropped more significantly than the slowdown in production.

Southeast Asia is a key export market for Chinese steel. In September, China’s steel exports to Thailand increased roughly 60% on the year, with shipments to Malaysia rising roughly 80%. Chinese steel exports doubled to Indonesia and more than quadrupled to Vietnam.

Business Transactions

This week's top funding events, acquisitions, and partnerships across industrial value chains

China EV maker Nio secures $2.2bn investment from Abu Dhabi

📅 Date: December 19, 2023
🔖 Topics: Funding Event
🏢 Organizations: Nio, CYVN Holdings

Chinese electric vehicle maker Nio will receive a $2.2 billion strategic investment from a fund backed by Abu Dhabi, as it bolsters finances in the face of growing competition. CYVN Holdings will acquire 294 million newly issued shares in Nio for $7.50 each by the end of the month. The purchase will increase CYVN’s ownership in Nio to around 20.1%.

AI-Driven Warehouse and Retail Automation Leader GreyOrange Closes on $135M Growth Financing

📅 Date: December 20, 2023
🏢 Organizations: GreyOrange, Anthelion Capital

GreyOrange Inc., a leader in AI-driven fulfillment automation, today announced the first close of its Series D funding, securing $135 million. Led by Anthelion Capital this investment reinforces GreyOrange’s innovative approach to transforming warehouse and retail store operations through a hardware-agnostic software platform and a dynamic range of certified robotic and sensing technologies.

GreyOrange will deploy the growth capital to accelerate the company’s technology leadership, continue its global expansion, and further support the adoption of GreyOrange’s fulfillment orchestration platform in warehouses, distribution centers, and retail stores.

TuMeke Raises $10M in Series A Funding led by Intel Capital

📅 Date: December 19, 2023
🏢 Organizations: TuMeke, Intel

TuMeke, a computer vision platform that automatically assesses injury risk in manufacturing facilities, raised $10M in a Series A funding round led by Intel Capital to expand and scale the TuMeke team of engineers, ergonomists, and academics.

TuMeke has become a key partner in manufacturing, empowering industry powerhouses such as AF Group, Chemtrade Logistics, Sentry Insurance, and more to prioritize ergonomic safety and establish a resilient workforce. With employee health at the center of company decisions and technology designs, the product offers swift and accurate ergonomic risk assessments without the need for wearables or extra equipment, emphasizing efficiency and user comfort.

Industrial edge platform Helin raises €3 million Seed round for seamles edger analytics

📅 Date: December 21, 2023
🏢 Organizations: Helin, FORWARD.one

Helin, a Netherlands developer of an industrial edge intelligence platform, has successfully raised a €3 million Seed round from FORWARD.one. Specialising in the maritime and energy sectors, Helin’s fully managed SaaS solution offers a seamless edge control experience, merging on-site systems with cloud data processing and remote AI applications.

Japan's Nippon Steel to acquire U.S. Steel for $14.9 billion

📅 Date: December 18, 2023
🔖 Topics: Acquisition
🏢 Organizations: Nippon Steel, US Steel

The acquisition of U.S. Steel will help Nippon, the world’s fourth largest steel maker, move toward 100 million metric tons of global crude steel capacity, while significantly expanding its production in the United States, where steel prices are expected to rise as automakers ramp up production following their recent deals with labor unions to end strikes. It said the synergies will come from pooling advanced production technology and know-how in product development, operations, energy savings and recycling.

Synopsys seeks to acquire engineering software company Ansys

📅 Date: December 22, 2023
🏢 Organizations: Synopsys, Ansys

Synopsys Inc, a maker of software used in chip design, has submitted an offer to acquire Ansys Inc, an engineering software vendor with a market value of $30 billion. Synopsys is one of the companies that has been in talks with Ansys about a potential deal, the sources said. Ansys has also attracted other suitors, and there is no certainty that Synopsys’ bid will prevail.

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