Keep the Assembly Line Moving

This week: C-Suite changes; AI transforms parts manufacturing, eliminates downtime, and manages industrial code; Capturing energy deep inside the earth; Light-speed computers; New chemical catalysts.

Dec 08, 2024

Shop Talk

Capturing this week's zeitgeist

The annual end-of-year executive shuffle reached its crescendo this week as organizations rushed to finalize and announce their leadership transitions before the holiday lull. These carefully orchestrated changes, often months in the making, tend to cluster in December’s early weeks, allowing incoming executives to begin planning for the new year while giving departing leaders a graceful exit during the quieter holiday period. Below is a round-up of the notable changes:

Intel announces retirement of CEO Pat Gelsinger and what it means.
Stellantis accepts CEO Carlos Tavares’ Resignation and attempts to stabilize the business.
Ørsted CEO of Americas David Hardy to leave the company to join GE Vernova, while hoping the wind returns to its sails.
Xiaomi VPs depart amid leadership reshuffle
Shapeways former COO and co-founder returns
Founders Fund GP Brian Singermann moves on

Assembly Line

This week's most influential Industry 4.0 media.

🗜️🧠 Using AI to Transform Part and Mold Manufacturing

✍️ Author: Christina Fuges
🏢 Organizations: Atomic Industries, LS Mtron

Atomic Industries’ mission to use cutting-edge digital manufacturing tools to make the best molds possible — faster and more inexpensively. It starts with AI-designed molds with features optimized for each part. To achieve this, Atomic has partnered with LS Mtron, which has outfitted the injection molding machines (IMM) Atomic uses with 46 I/O ports to capture and leverage a wealth of process data.

“Our long-term vision is to use this technology to change the way parts are made — because ultimately, the most important part of widget production is the mold. Our goal is to commoditize the mold-building process, so when we quote a project we’ll only be quoting a part price — the cost of the mold will be rolled into that cost,” Atomic co-founder Lou Young says.

“In the industry now, when an automaker is kicking off an A-pillar, they have 20 or 30 people around the room going, ‘Here’s where we want the gates’ for one little plastic part. And the car has thousands of plastic parts in it. The AI-designed injection mold we’re building is going to have the best gate location possible for that part and the best waterline design. You won’t need 30 people sitting around a table to ensure it runs right. It’s just going to run right. That mindset will start to shift, says Young.

From DevOps to Building AI for Industrial Code: Copia CEO

🏢 Organizations: Copia Automation

♨️ The hunt for heat: Drilling the deepest holes on Earth

✍️ Author: Normal Miller
🏢 Organizations: Quaise Energy, GA Drilling, Eavor, University of Oxford

Quaise Energy, a spin-off from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), for example, are aiming to drill holes as deep as 12 miles (20km) to access temperatures of 500C (932F) or more. To do so, they are turning to a tool that draws on years of research into nuclear fusion power. “While others are putting shovels in the ground, we’re putting microwaves in the ground for the first time,” says the company’s co-founder Matt Houde.

Slovakia-based GA Drilling, meanwhile, is exploring a different high-energy drill technology to bore into the Earth’s crust. It is using a pulse plasma drill, based on very short high energy electric discharges that disintegrate rock without causing it to melt. This avoids creating any viscous molten rock, which can be difficult to remove and can stop drill bits penetrating further. “Since the process is very swift with short shocks crumbling the rock, there isn’t time for melt to form – so the need to pull up and replace the bit is greatly reduced,” says Igor Kocis, chief executive and chairman of GA Drilling. “Five to eight kilometres (3-5 miles) is a target for our current development programme – and later 10km-plus,” he adds. “These depths will allow nearly universal access to geothermal power.”

Moore's Law is Dead — Welcome to Light Speed Computers

💿 Electronics hustle:

Building Apple Products Has Become a Side Hustle for China’s Biggest EV Maker, BYD [WSJ]
DeepX DX-M1 AI Chip Hits 90% Yield with Samsung’s 5nm Technology [WinBuzzer]
Tenstorrent Raises $693 Million Series D [EETimes]
Japan’s audacious bid to become a semiconductor superpower [FT]

NVIDIA Advances Physical AI With Accelerated Robotics Simulation on AWS

🏢 Organizations: NVIDIA, AWS

NVIDIA announced at AWS re:Invent that Isaac Sim now runs on Amazon Elastic Cloud Computing (EC2) G6e instances accelerated by NVIDIA L40S GPUs. And with NVIDIA OSMO, a cloud-native orchestration platform, developers can easily manage their complex robotics workflows across their AWS computing infrastructure.

Physical AI describes AI models that can understand and interact with the physical world. It embodies the next wave of autonomous machines and robots, such as self-driving cars, industrial manipulators, mobile robots, humanoids and even robot-run infrastructure like factories and warehouses. With physical AI, developers are embracing a three computer solution for training, simulation and inference to make breakthroughs.

🧑‍💻🦾 Robotics engineers are in high demand — but what is the job really like?

⚗️ Bayesian optimization of radical polymerization reactions in a flow synthesis system

✍️ Authors: Shogo Takasuka, Sho Ito, Shunto Oikawa
🏢 Organizations: Nara Institute of Science and Technology

Proportions of monomers in a copolymer will greatly affect the properties of materials. However, due to a phenomenon known as composition drift, the proportions of monomers in a copolymer can deviate from the value expected from the raw monomer ratio because of differences in monomer reactivity. It is therefore necessary to optimize the polymerization process to account for such composition drift. In the present study, styrene-methyl methacrylate copolymers were generated using a flow synthesis system and the processing variables were tuned employing Bayesian optimization (BO) to obtain a target composition.

🔗 Catalyzing chain reactions:

Concerted methane fixation at ambient temperature and pressure mediated by an alcohol oxidase and Fe-ZSM-5 catalytic couple [nature catalysis]
Highly efficient Co-added Ni/CeO2 catalyst for co-production of hydrogen and carbon nanotubes by methane decomposition [Fuel Processing Technology]
A universal strategy for decoupling stiffness and extensibility of polymer networks [Science Advances]

New Product Introduction

Highlighting new and innovative facilities, processes, products, and services

Cemex kickstarts first-of-a-kind low-carbon hydrogen project using thermal plasma electrolysis in cement production

🔖 Topics: Partnership
🏢 Organizations: Cemex, HiiROC

Cemex Ventures, Cemex’s corporate venture capital (CVC) and open innovation unit, announced an initial hydrogen deployment at industrial scale with HiiROC, the pioneering British hydrogen company that produces affordable, clean hydrogen, at its Rugby cement plant in the United Kingdom. Hydrogen has emerged as a low-carbon energy source within the construction industry’s decarbonization roadmap and offers potential as an energy solution to help reduce the sector’s reliance on fossil fuels and lower CO2 emissions. This venture marks a significant milestone for Cemex, as it represents the beginning of a large-scale strategic project plan with the aim to further lower its carbon emissions in cement production.

HiiROC produces carbon-neutral hydrogen using its proprietary Thermal Plasma Electrolysis (TPE) process, which requires just one-fifth of the electrical energy used in water electrolysis and captures carbon as a solid byproduct, avoiding CO2 emissions – a game-changer for the industry. HiiROC’s modular solution can be deployed as single units to full-scale industrial plants. The hydrogen produced can be used as an alternative energy source to fuel clinker production processes, helping Cemex to achieve its decarbonization goals.

🦿 Mecalux and MIT launch Intelligent Logistics Systems Lab

🏢 Organizations: MIT, Mecalux

Mecalux SA and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced a five-year project to expedite the integration of artificial intelligence in logistics. The partners said they will use the MIT Intelligent Logistics Systems Lab to explore new applications of AI models “with significant potential for business and society.”

In the first year of their collaboration, the teams at the MIT Intelligent Logistics Systems Lab and Mecalux plan to research two ways to accelerate innovation. The first will focus on increasing the productivity of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs). Using advanced simulation, optimization, and machine learning techniques, researchers will develop a “swarm intelligence” system enabling multiple robots to operate as a single entity, making collective decisions. The second research area will center on training self-learning AI models. The Intelligent Logistics Systems Lab intends to design systems capable of learning from demand patterns and anticipating new customer purchasing habits.

Business Transactions

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

🇺🇸 Tractian Raises $120M to Eliminate Industrial Downtime Worldwide

🔖 Topics: Funding Event
🏢 Organizations: Tractian, Sapphire Ventures

Tractian, a leader in Manufacturing AI, secured $120M in Series C funding led by Sapphire Ventures, with participation from General Catalyst, Next47, and NGP Capital. This latest investment solidifies the Atlanta-based company as a key player in the industrial maintenance space.

This funding will accelerate Tractian’s mission to optimize machine performance and ensure unprecedented uptime. As the Industrial Copilot, Tractian stands out by providing integrated hardware and software solutions for industrial asset monitoring, physical operations, and maintenance management, helping companies ensure zero downtime and improve technicians’ productivity.

🇺🇸 AMP Raises $91 Million in Series D Funding to Revolutionize Waste

🏢 Organizations: AMP Robotics, Congruent Ventures

AMP Robotics Corp. (“AMP”), a leading provider of AI-powered sortation at scale for the waste and recycling industry, has raised $91 million in corporate equity in a Series D financing led by Congruent Ventures. The round featured participation from current and new investors, including Sequoia Capital, XN, Blue Earth Capital, Liberty Mutual Investments, California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS), Wellington Management, Range Ventures, and Tao Capital Partners.

AMP will use the latest funding to accelerate the deployment of its AMP ONE™ systems, which are capable of cost-effectively sorting municipal solid waste (MSW), as demonstrated by the first-of-its-kind system AMP operates in Portsmouth, Virginia. Last month, AMP also entered into an agreement with Waste Connections, Inc. (TSX/NYSE: WCN) to equip and operate one of Waste Connections’ single-stream recycling facilities in Colorado. AMP ONE provides a full-scale facility solution to sort various material streams and capture more of the billions of dollars in value otherwise lost to landfills or incinerated annually.

🇲🇽 Prima Secures $42.5 Million to Transform Manufacturing Across North America

🏢 Organizations: Prima

Prima, a technology-first manufacturing and supply chain integrator creating a more reliable procurement experience for North American companies, announced that it has raised USD $23 million in funding, bringing its total funding in previously-undisclosed rounds to USD $42.5 million. Prima’s investors include Acrew, Quona Capital, Nazca, Greenoaks, Canary, NXTP, Picus Capital, Endeavor, Fluent Ventures, K50 Ventures, Marathon Ventures, Box Group and WTI, as well as 110+ angel investors from the industrial ecosystem. The funds will allow Prima to expand its operations and continue its quest to elevate Mexico’s manufacturing base to higher standards and address key industry issues of availability, quality, fulfillment rates, and cost – all of which have long plagued manufacturing and supply chains in Mexico in particular.

🇩🇪 FibreCoat, world leader in materials technology, secures close to €20m from NewSpace Capital and other investors

🏢 Organizations: FibreCoat, NewSpace Capital

FibreCoat, a world leader in materials technology, has raised close to €20 million from NewSpace Capital, Goose Capital, Nova Saint-Gobain, 212 NexT, Otto Krahn New Business, Convergent Ventures and TiE in its Series B raise.

The company, which was founded in Germany in 2020 but has been developing its technology since 2014, has invented a novel technology to coat metals and plastics onto fibers, thus combining the properties of the fibers and the coating material, during the fibre spinning process. Its products offer strength, conductivity, and recyclability at a fraction of the weight and cost of their competitor products. This is thanks to the team’s extensive expertise and strong research-and-development background at RWTH Aachen University, where the founding team worked at the Institute for Textile Technology.

🇺🇸 Fabri is shaping the future of AM in foundries

✍️ Author: Davide Sher
🏢 Organizations: Fabri, Lavrock Ventures, Raytheon

Fabri completed a $5 million seed funding round, led by Lavrock Ventures with participation from RTX Ventures, Tenon Ventures, and SBXi. This funding represents a major step forward in the company’s mission to revolutionize the investment casting industry by delivering precision metal castings with unparalleled speed and cost-effectiveness.

The $5 million seed funding will enable Fabri to scale its operations and enhance proprietary technologies. This investment also facilitates broader market reach, allowing the company to provide its transformative solutions to a wider audience and empowering businesses to innovate without compromise. The company’s backers’ support highlights the industry’s recognition of Fabri’s ability to deliver value and transformative change.

🇮🇹 Quindi raises €525K Seed for smart manufacturing production co-pilot

🏢 Organizations: Quindi, Open Venture

Smart manufacturing startup Quindi has raised €525,000 in initial Seed funding. Founded in 2022, Quindi has developed the first Production copilot, an advanced AI solution that integrates all data from machinery, orders, and people to optimise production flows.

The funding was raised from Open Venture, a venture capital vehicle born within the Open Advisory ecosystem and ELIS Group, a consortium of more than 140 companies pursuing open innovation, vocational education and sustainable development goals.

🇫🇷 AI Simulation Leader Cosmo Tech Receives Majority Investment from Insight Partners and Former Accenture Executives

🔖 Topics: Acquisition
🏢 Organizations: Insight Partners, Cosmo Tech

Cosmo Tech, a market leader in AI Simulation software for enterprise decision making, today announced a majority investment from global software investor Insight Partners, with participation from former Accenture executives Phillip Hazen and Gerry Coulter. As part of the transaction, Hazen and Coulter will be appointed as Cosmo Tech’s CEO and CFO, respectively. Cosmo Tech helps large organizations navigate complexity and uncertainty in enterprise decisioning.

Following the funding, Cosmo Tech will establish a new office in the DC metro area—an innovation hub and key access point to major clients and ecosystems—anticipated to open in early 2025. In addition to the existing European commercial and product resources, this new base will support the company’s North American operations and facilitate closer collaboration with the partner ecosystem and key customers in the manufacturing, transportation, and energy sectors.

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