How to Get Started on Automation, Right Now - Four Conversations with Tech Experts at The Automated Shop Conference

industry leaders. you'll expand your professional development in hundreds of concurrent sessions, workshops and tours and learn from innovative keynote speakers and leaders and the vision mainstage. I'll be at the Career Tech Expo checking out the hundreds of exhibits workshops and live demonstrations and in the career pavilion learning about high demand careers in the learning systems that prepare

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People who are not afraid to think differently, not afraid to try something new, all with the goal of securing the American Dream for the next generation of STEM and workforce talent. Welcome to the tech ed podcast. I am your host, Matt Kirchner and in this episode, we are reflecting on all the great things that we learned at task.

The automated shop conference in Novi Michigan, we're machining companies from all over the United States and beyond and suppliers of amazing automation technology to those companies converged to learn about the future of manufacturing. The event was sponsored by organizations like Gartner Business Media, modern machine

shop production machining. And the tech ed podcast had a huge role as the CO technical director along with modern machine shops Editor in Chief, Brent Donaldson, we did a series of interviews with the featured speakers to learn where manufacturing technology is going. And it is our pleasure to share those with you in this episode of The Tech Ed podcast.

Welcome back to the tech guy

podcast. It is your host, Matt Kirchner, we continue to be on location in Novi, Michigan at task, the automated shaft conference where we have manufacturers especially people in the world of contract machining from all over the globe, converging here to learn about the latest and advanced manufacturing technology, recruiting talent understanding how to deploy automation, understanding Cobots I've learned so much we're continuing to learn so much and we are about to learn even more course

being here in Novi, Michigan, not far from Detroit. Another area that isn't too far from Detroit is Auburn Hills, Rochester Hills, Michigan, automation alley. And if you don't know what I'm getting to now, you will know in just a moment that that is the home to the largest robotics company in the world, at least their North American manufacturing and sales operations and its service operations in that company, of

course, is FANUC. America. And we are absolutely honored to be joined by the Executive Director of Global accounts, Jerry Perez, from FANUC. America Jerry, it's awesome to have you on the tech guy Podcast.

conversation. Now, most of our listeners, because they're plugged into advanced manufacturing, they're plugged into education, they're plugged into manufacturing technology, no FANUC America, but for the one or two people that maybe aren't totally familiar with the work that you're doing, give us the quick elevator speech on the importance of FANUC America and what you're up to.

of our business, right. But that's us. Automation are what were our message this year is where there's automation. There's FANUC, right? So we can think about that where there's automation. There's FANUC. That's us. FANUC

started. But no matter where they are, everybody just agrees that we have so much optimism for the future of manufacturing, in my case, American manufacturing, huge advocate for that. So we're really, really excited to be here with you. I'm excited for this talk. Like you're going to give this afternoon as well, a lot of times when we think about automation, and when we think about integrating robotics, people are thinking about the large fortune 500 brand names

that everybody knows. And, and the truth of the matter is that there's this huge opportunity in our small to mid sized businesses around deploying automation. And I want to say that your topic this afternoon, relates to how small to midsize companies can leverage collaborative robotics Cobots in their manufacturing operations,

is that right? What's that one message or that one takeaway that you want your listeners to walk away from your presentation with as they go back to work from wherever they came from here in the United States around the globe?

their company, right? That is an assertion we make, right, and something that I've discovered is, and I've consulted with smaller companies and implement even myself, I worked for a small manufacturer, where they said, you know, can we just get one robot? Right? The challenges the large manufacturer faces are that small, you know, Job Shop, medium shops, small shop, the

same, huh. And one of the challenges that I see common is the skill sets you need when you're identifying which system, you know, what system do I want to automate? What tool am I

going to use? That comes with experience, and whether you're a large company or small company, that experience has retired, that experience, you know, has gone out to, you know, different integrators as our whole, you know, marketplace has grown and grown and grown, the amount of resources required to implement it, program it but also even figure out the process for how to identify which is the right application, right, that also has retired or it's gone thin.

Alright, so whether a large company or a small company, I feel that I'm advising the same type of advising and asking and answering the same type of question. Sure, whether large or small, absolutely. Right. So it's one of the messages I want people to take away from the talk today is, even though I'm a small company, wow, there really isn't in reality, this or I'm a small company, I only can do these things, as if these other larger companies don't have those challenges.

consumption. So all of the same things that a large fortune 100 company would deal with similar problems and challenges that we're dealing with in a small to mid sized business, maybe just add a little bit different scale, and possibly with fewer resources to be able to respond

to some of those challenges. And so in as much as some of the challenges that the small to midsize companies phase might not be too much different from the large companies talk about how both are using collaborative robotics to solve for manufacturing problems? Sure.

talking about robotics here. So it's easier to program easier to implement, right, I can move it around by hand, it has a much more positive experience. Sure, I call it that let threshold when you're learning something new, you know, absolutely, like that kind of pain threshold. Like I don't know how to learn this right. Cobots typically have a much lower threshold of for learning something new. So whether a small company large company with you don't have the resources available? Cobots are

the I say easier? First Choice? Sure. Right, kind of the gateway for you know, future automation? Absolutely.

involved in now increasingly, becoming automated using robots and Cobots as well. But one of the challenges there was actually getting somebody into the weld booth, right? I mean, they were afraid once as soon as the sparks start flying, as soon as things heated up, and you were laying a bead that started to be a little bit intimidating.

In the same way with a, you know, a complicated, maybe a more complicated robot where you're understanding Cartesian coordinates, and you're doing point to point programming and so on, might be a little bit more of a threshold. The goal at get over a robot that's moving at 750 millimeters a second that can be a little bit intimidating

for folks as well. So this whole world of collaborative robot Next, where we can get right in the workstyle, depending on the application with the robot, and work hand in hand with it a much, much more, I think low challenge way for people to get into the world of automation and robotics. Totally.

next to somebody. Right? So and that's, you know, in reality, we always were, you know, Fanuc, we're always talking about the end user or the integrator or do it yourself, do your risk assessment. Right, right. Should I have a fence is this is this product sharp, I'm going to be carrying around you know, we're talking machine tending exactly she intending you have sharp bits that come off of it, I get machine, it's like, is that gonna be safe to have somebody

around? I don't know. But Cobots are easy to program, it's easy to teach my next part, you know, somebody gave a talk yesterday about my take you four hours to learn this cool new technology that's going to transform my business. But it only takes me 1015 minutes to teach my next part, and the next part for job shops. So, you know, even though we may not work next to people Cobots, it's we're thinking about easy, flexible, you know,

low barrier to entry. That's kind of you know, you think about the word co but I think that's how the market relates to that today versus just working next to somebody. Absolutely.

relatable. And I think this whole this whole idea of collaborative robotics it is, it's more relatable, it's simpler, and it's less intimidating, and in so many ways is revolutionizing manufacturing, it's going to be fun to be in the world of manufacturing for the next five

years. One of the things that I admire Jerry about your role in manufacturing, is you really get to see cutting edge application of automation and advanced manufacturing technology, you are working with some of the most advanced and recognizable names in manufacturing that are deploying things that I think would have been unimaginable five or 10 years ago, it's got to be incredibly rewarding. Is that what you love most about

your job? What do you love about being the executive director of global accounts?

physical thing, right. So strategy in place, and then seeing numbers of robots get deployed somewhere or deploying it, let's say, Hey, I'm a job shop. But right one plant needs one robot. And then yeah, we got that done, but then actually seeing the physical thing happen. Right. So the new technologies that weren't available, there's challenges that that are I say, applications that customers asked us to do. 20 years ago? Yeah. Right. I worked on myself with my hands trying to make it

work. And we did have some of these cool, you know, automatic path generation programs. Yeah, we had gray matter talking at the conference here, automatic path generation. And we did that I'm doing in 2008. It cost $2 million to do that, wow. $2 million for one system. And now they're deploying these with this robot as a service model. Right. Right. So don't pay for it until it until it starts working. Exactly. This is

working right here. So there's such there's odd, I call them automation, enabling technologies. One of the great I say, okay, benefits of working at FANUC of being you know, the leader of the best is we have access to not just our products, but the the top leading edge technologies, which make the implementation of robots a lot easier. I don't know how to, I don't have to know how to code. I don't have to know how to set

up vision. Right, right. I mean, I'm a robot, I needed to touch see things before even two, three years ago, you might have to set up all these programs to do all the setup your vision programs. Now, there's companies where I can just send you an image send you a file, and you automatically generated for me, that's that is automation, enabling technologies.

those spaces. One of the things that we're curious for the folks we're chatting about here a task Jerry is, as we look to the future of automation and manufacturing, you'll look out five or 10 years, what are some of those trends or maybe one in particular, that you think is really really driving change in the world of advanced manufacturing?

problem statement. They're in a warehouse and somebody's moving boxes, right? There's, you know, in terms of a lots of labor, but I'm not moving 150 pound parts, right? So these are lightweight robots that have to move around. And typical industrial robots 480 volts, so I need 110 volts. Or maybe I can drive down to lower DC, you know, driven motors, right? Sure. See, take a

market like that. And maybe what comes out of this new general purpose type robot, somewhere between collaborative and industrial robots, where lightweight, just enough payload easy to power can stick it on top of an ATV or an Amr, right. Yeah, I start to see markets like that start to influence making products available now. No, market wide.

able to do it. And the rest of us end up being the beneficiaries of that, because they're doing the kind of the r&d on their own coming up with the use cases, the applications, the, you know, the financial justifications for doing it. And then the rest of us learn from that. And it just really, totally changes entire markets. And that's going to be exciting.

I think, as you suggested, the idea about robots becoming even more deployable, even safer to work around having all these different applications being able to change the application, right. So we don't necessarily have to automate a work cell to make the same part for the next 10 years, I can use a collaborative robot or hybrid robot of some some sort, doing one operation and maybe in two months that my process changes.

Now, I can reprogram that right in house for another application, I think it's it's gonna be a fun time to be in manufacturing.

Look at those two markets, there are tons of job shops that probably could utilize automation with a labor shortages for sure. Same thing in the foodservice industry, right. So we've got our eyes Poised on taking some of these products and make you know, getting to deploy them and all these other these other markets that could actually use them and are ready to receive them.

tending. I mean, it's just awesome. And I can't can't imagine a better person Jerry than you to sit here and have this conversation, around advancements in manufacturing with all of your experience all the different applications you've seen, and all the amazing companies that you had the opportunity to work work with. Really appreciate you being here at tasks, sharing that vast knowledge with the audience here. And being here on the tech guy podcast, sharing your vast

knowledge with our audience. I can't thank you enough for your time and really appreciate you being here.

that in a minute. But for the customers and our and for our audience, I should say that maybe aren't perfectly familiar with the great work that AMD is doing. Why don't you tell us a little bit about AMT? Right?

what we need, right? We need the absolute best companies, the best talent, the best innovation, the best ideas, and we We need all of that to converge in ways that really drives robotics and automation forward, I can tell you that it is certainly in my career, and I've spent 25 plus years in manufacturing now, absolutely the most exciting time to be in this space, I'm going to say in the history of the planet fair to say, Oh,

evolution of robotics. And something that I like to say is a famous quote, the future is already here. It's just not very evenly distributed. So the sort of robotics that you see, that seem available and obvious in the Silicon Valley region, are not widely available. And many people here are working without access, without knowledge of what is going to be available more broadly, in robotics and

automation. In the same way, there's also a disconnect from seeing how robots are being applied in real work, use cases, and allowing entrepreneurs to actually understand that more deeply and meet some of the real pain points. Some of the most successful robotics, entrepreneurs and companies are founded by people that have both deep experience in robotics, but also deep experience in the industry that they're developing

robots for. And we need to close that disconnect, we need to bring the workers and the company owners, together with the robotics company, founders and developers.

operation. And it feels a little bit like that's part of the disconnect that you're referring to, is that we have to really, you can't just take industry, 4.0 technology, smart sensors, smart devices, automation, and become an expert in that and walk into a manufacturing operation, a food production operation, a distribution operation, and pretend to know how to put that technology to work in a way that's going to benefit that individual operation. Is that what you're getting? Yeah,

looking for. But at the rate that the industries need new robotics and automation, and the options in robotics and automation are growing, I don't think that we can keep up, we are seeing a kind of collapse, with the development of a collapse of the middle with the development of no code

solutions. For example, a number of the robotics companies, Representative speaking, have talked about how these days you buy the box with the robot in it, and you look at the manuals and watch the videos for a day, you can be directly empowered to be using the technology. And those fundamental principles of good design that was really one of the points that I wanted to make in my talk is, we don't need to teach our toddlers how to use smartphones and tablets, they learn that rapidly all by

themselves. We don't need to teach our kids how to play computer games, or even our adults and I confess to having played computer games myself,

robot programming. And there's still some of this going in and understanding Cartesian coordinate systems and and understanding you know, point to point programming and explaining exactly what a robot where it needs to go using Cartesian coordinates telling the gripper to open and so on in the evolution from that to being able to lead a robot through a program with your hand Two things like black programming and understanding that we don't necessarily need to know all

those programming languages in some instances. And what I hear you getting at is that we will reach a point at some time, where we're using artificial intelligence. And we're just basically saying, you know, using voice recognition, I want the robot to do X, Y, and Z. And there'll be a platform working in the background with some algorithm that will say, Okay, I heard this, and it will program the robot for us is that is that really where you think we're going? We're already

up for you. Not only will it be more productive than you think it will be far less likely to go wrong. And it will allow you to develop an ownership on the process of automation, you'll find and so many stories of this, where the staff start going, well, heck, if the robot can do that, can I get it to do this over here and that over there. And that means that you are owning the process. And I think that's really the the way you have to do it. Start small, but get started.

are coming out now. So it's going to be a lot easier for you to get started.

So it's just such a really exciting time to be sitting in this world of automation of advanced manufacturing of industry. 4.0, seeing the world change, right, right before our very eyes literally right before our very eyes and things that we're talking about today. And using terms like GPT. Today, if we had mentioned that two years ago, 99% of the world would have no idea what we're talking about. And today, everybody can relate to it amazing how fast

this technology is moving. And it's also amazing some of the trends we're seeing in automation and advanced manufacturing, and Andrew and as much as you're working with manufacturers all over the country all around the globe, seeing some of the most trending advancements in industrial technology. Tell us about if you could pick one trend that you see in advanced manufacturing or in robotics or automation that our audience should be keen to and listening to. What would that be? Again,

operation. But doing it autonomously, it's as if there's a driver in there, but it's doing it on its own is that is that the first trend that you're pointing to? That's exactly

it manually. Or you can just say, Okay, now I've driven it over here, and I've done something, go back to base without needing to have a person tied down to what is often the highly repetitive traveling transit times and material movements, we need to start thinking about every part of every process and every machine as becoming mobile.

pointing to. And it's a huge opportunity for us to reduce costs, bring more and more fascinating products and amazing solutions to more and more people make the world a better place to live, which I really feel like we can do through automation. Is that fair to say? Is that the way you think about it? Oh,

steps along the supply chain. If we can empower small medium enterprises to be able to produce a full range of products, then we're bringing local manufacturing really back. And I think what excites me about robotics, is that I really believe that we're moving away from the mess manufacturing, and mass agriculture, mess, every industry back to local scale, that's better for people better for the economy, and better for the environment. No

that everybody endured. One of the silver linings, I believe, as a result of going through that was that people who before really had little appreciation for supply chain and manufacturing, because they could get what they wanted when they wanted at a price that they were willing to pay. And all of a sudden, that whole world goes away. And you can't find things

as simple as toilet paper. In some cases, all of a sudden, you have a really good appreciation for how important it is to have manufacturing closer and closer and closer to the point of use and consumption for all of the reasons that you mentioned. And robotics and automation in in small to midsize businesses adapting that technology are probably the biggest key to seeing that Renaissance, which I believe we're already seeing, not just here in the United States of America, but around

the globe. Such an exciting time for us to be involved in the world of manufacturing and really an exciting time for us to spend some time with Andrew K, the Vice President of Global robotics, for AMT. Andrew, thanks so much for being on.

But before we do that, Steve, I just want to welcome you here to the studio of the tech guy podcast. Thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it. Thanks, man. So you're here all the way from Southeast Wisconsin. You and I are here now in southeastern Michigan just outside of Detroit, Novi,

Michigan to be exact. And you have a pretty important role as a as a VP at a Sita just start out telling us a little bit about what a Sita does and then how you partner with manufacturers and and others to automate their operations.

material removal. So aside from just the custom side of our business, we also have a standard products division, where those are going to be pre engineered solutions with with quicker deliveries and a lower entry point cost.

are those hidden factors? How do we need to be looking at return on investment in this new day and age of automation? Sure,

return on investment. Because, you know, there's a lot of things beyond that, that really affect the bottom line. And when we look at those hidden factors, it's things like consistency, and it actually is a big one, when you have operators doing things, sometimes the consistency is not there, or sometimes the task that they're at, they're supposed to do, it just takes a takes a lot of effort. And so they're, it's not the same consistent product

every time. So when you introduce automation, once that process has proven out, you're confident that that robot is going to produce the same same end result time in time out. And really with the consistency side of it, aside from having a more a better quality product, you reduce scrap and scrap as a you know, as a cost that can be

greatly reduced from that. I mean, there's other large things, you know, that you have to consider with like lights out operations, many times, you just don't think you have the capacity for a second or third shift because you don't have the employees, once you add automation, you can start to do that you can start to add a second and third shift and that that right there, it can really accelerate the return on investment on a second or third shift. And things like employee

retention as well. I mean, that's, that's a big one today, because one, it's hard to, to attract employees. And it's even harder to retain employees. And so you know, when when we have these these dirty or mundane or jobs that you know, typical employees don't want to do, you're not going to keep them around long if you expect them to be doing those tasks. And that's really where we introduce

automation. And automation can do these these tasks and open up these these, you know, higher paying more challenging jobs for your employees, which will lead to more happier employees, which leads to longer retention. And I mean, really, when you look at the cost of hiring somebody, I mean, I think they estimate you can assume it's a third of that physicians salary per year just just to hire and onboard an employee. So you don't want to

be doing that often. Because that's just that's lost money.

math on it. And people are always surprised to hear that, you know, my target was always a six month payback. And I would go as far in those days as 18 months. And if we had to go further than 18 months. In other words, if I was going to invest $100,000, in some solution, I wanted that $100,000 Back in the form of cost reductions over the course of a year and a half. And if I couldn't get it, then we would go looking somewhere else.

And I would say there's got to be No, you can always find something, there's got to be something better. When we think about automation. You know, we call it the kind of the long view of return on investment. You got to expand that discussion beyond just what are my actual cost reductions to your point and we start thinking about all the other benefits that come from automating, you mentioned consistency,

absolutely. We have a more consistent product, we're improving yield, we're probably, uh, certainly we're not making mistakes on the line, we're probably improving line uptime. As a result of that. We have this this opportunity to redeploy our people as you as you discussed, and it's kind of hard sometimes to quantify what

the value of that is. But tell us a little bit Steve about for that employee who now has their job freed up because of the manual labor they were doing is now being done using automation. What kind of opportunities exist for those folks? Typically, you

things like that. Robot programming and process improvement and maybe gauging and quality and, and the sorts so it just it just opens up many different avenues for higher skilled positions that, you know, what we find a lot with the younger generations is they want to be challenged. And you know, if we don't challenge them, they're gonna they're gonna walk out. And so things like robot programming is definitely one way to challenge them and to problem solve. And automation definitely helps it.

people talk about that. And they almost talk about executing on automation, the same way that people in my generation talked about working on their cars. And they'd be like, you know, somebody would have this, you know, whatever they did, they put a new exhaust system on their car, and it created a different noise, or they put some different tint on their window. Oh, man, that is so sick. And now you've got these guys that are talking about doing the same thing with

automation. And it really is when he talked about the importance of retention, you talk about just the excitement of working around automation, these are really cool careers, aren't they? They

of discovery for them. But as I mentioned, a lot of problem solving, and it opens the door up to be creative like that.

But but when you look at the advent of Cobots number one, the way that we program and when programming a traditional robot, it's really showing that robot a point in space or Cartesian coordinate and saying, Go here, open the gripper, kind of

programming the whole thing. Now we have lead to programming where you can literally stand right next to a Koba in program with your hand, I mean, you don't necessarily have to have all of this experience, depending on what the application is, allows us to be a lot more creative and trying different things, seeing what's

going to work. And then of course, the other aspect of an individual being able to work in the same work cell safely with a robot, if I have a traditional robot that's traveling at, you know, 750 millimeters a second, I'm not going to be want to be anywhere near that thing when it's doing its job, right. But with a traditional COBOL that knows I'm there that is going to, you know, move itself out of the way if I'm in the way and so on lots and lots more applications, is that the kind

of thing you're seeing? Yeah,

But when you put a collaborative robot in front of somebody they have, they feel like they have control, you know, they can grab it, they can move around, they can program it, it just takes the fear factor right out of it. And it's the it's the ease of use. And so maybe even beyond that is is things like HMI as you know, the human machine interface, how you interact with

the system. And as those improve software improves, it makes it easier to to interact and one to understand how to interact with with robots. But the collaborative side is really what I think is opening up the door for that ease of use and, and, you know, making people more comfortable with automation. And I see that trend really, really expanding in like, what we find is even on the collaborative side, typically those robots are slower, right, because there's less safety and they stop if

they bump into you. Well, we're finding a like a multiuse form, if you will, because we will take we will fence these robots in. And we will put them in high speed mode out of collaborative mode. But then when an operator comes close to the cell, we will drop it back down to collaborative mode. So we've we found a way to utilize both the high speed side of a robot but yet still utilize the collaborative side to just keep that productivity up and up and running no matter what's going on

a career. I mean, you're now vice president of one of the if not the most recognized robotics integrators in the country that's gonna make you really, really proud and you should be what is your message to a young person who is considering one of these careers in advanced manufacturing and automation and robotics and integration? If you could share one thing with them, what would it be?

that goes on. And so there are a lot of challenging positions available. And there's a lot of opportunity for growth, huge

world. But we are going to remember the great points that you had today, Steve about return on investment, the great points that you had about the advent of collaborative robotics and some of the trends taking place in automation. Really appreciate you spending some time with us. You're a fascinating individual, and thanks for being on.

put that to work. And I think the most important part for us is that we want to invest in companies to create good paying jobs in the region, we're not we're not interested in you know, sending it south of the border or to Southeast Asia, we really want to grow, continue to grow manufacturing locally. So that's one of our core beliefs.

The second part is whatever we invest in, we are trying to structure it in a way that there is some value creation and some value creation for the employees, not just for the investors. And so will we create win win for all stakeholders, and not just the shareholders, really the stakeholders, so we look at the employees, of course, we'll look at customers, we'll look at suppliers, and have a collaborative environment where we grow overall, for everybody. You know,

We've heard a lot about collaborative robotics, and in all kinds of robotics here a task this week, tell us a little bit about the presentation. And if you would, what is that one key takeaway that you really want to drive home to the audience during your presentation later today?

jump right in and get going. And so today, the presentation is really about not only, let's say digital inspection, which has come a long way and or excess PACOM very fast, kind of like to become very reliable, and relatively easy to install. But then combining this technology was a collaborative robot where you actually no also can, you know, let's say with some labor, or with some productivity improvements, and do this without affecting your cycle

time. So it's really about combining technologies, because I think that is really the key right now with all those new technologies. Everybody can buy a cobalt, everybody can buy a robot, everybody can buy a camera or a 3d printer. But I really see the advantages of these technologies when you start combining it with each other. And then you will really, really, let's say make, you know, make really, really fast and progress and make some big

steps forward. For me. I think the number one thing to the audience is there's already so much knowledge out there. So look and reach out To people who have done it uses conference, you know, connect on LinkedIn, ask once in a while maybe somebody will say no. But I think fundamentally, we all evolving a little bit more into a space where we're willing to share more, especially if it's

not directly competitor. And I really hope as a presentation to embrace, to connect people to connect companies that they can share with each other, learn from each other, that we don't all have to start from scratch, you're in

isn't each other necessarily. It is the rate of adoption of these new technologies, it's how quickly can we deploy them? How quickly can we innovate, how quickly can as several other speakers have talked about fill the gap in manufacturing, that is being left by people, you know, who've had an incredibly rewarding careers in manufacturing now being able to really enjoy the blessings and the fruits of all their labor, and they're retiring out of the workforce and, and leaving a

gap. And we can fill that gap in so many ways, using automation using technology. In certainly whether that's the manufacturing side of things, that's the inspection side of things and driving quality into the process, we can use technology for all this, I'd be curious Fabian to just to go a little bit more in detail on the technology itself. So you're talking about using Cobots. I heard maybe, maybe vision systems, I don't know if you're integrating 3d 3d scanning and

so on. But tell me a little bit more about the technology and how you see that advancing,

Even more exciting for me is probably advanced robots with advanced robots, I look at it more on the, let's say, what is now available low cost, like we looked at yesterday, the robot from, you know, companies, where you can buy it for like three, four, or 5000 $5,000, they probably don't last 20 years, but it doesn't matter. So I think these technologies now, this case, it's actually made out of plastic from Vegas. And then there are other companies

out there. But But I was really excited about that this is now a threshold, like there's no more excuse for anybody to get involved, because I think almost every company can risk four or $5,000, to start playing with it a little bit. And you know, and just get in, get into it. And I'm convinced that 8090 Probably over 90%, who gets were not involved in automation today, and get started with it, that they will stick with it, because

there will is a big payback. And that's just an overall big enhancement of your organization. And

and so on. And so to me, it's almost like table stakes for being in manufacturing and to your point, that the cost of investing in automation anymore should no longer be an impedance, you know, if I have to buy a 50 or $100,000 robot, and there's still lots of applications for those types of robots, but you know, that might be price prohibitive for me but but if I can get in with a you know, a collaborative robot, and at least get my, you know, a low low cost one and at least get my

toe wet in the world of automation and start learning and in the end, then we see all the benefits that come from that. Now we can start to kind of readdress the ROI, understand a little bit that maybe a more robust investment is going to create payback, because we've had a few early successes, is that what you're getting? No,

really advance a career. But even the most important part, for my view, it creates an environment of supports critical thinking, it, you know, makes you or makes teams eventually an incubator for new ideas when you stimulate their minds with those kinds of technologies, and then also easy to interact with that all of a sudden the script flips around and while you may be been the beginning, give some direction for the models

activities. Eventually your team will flip around it will come with new ideas and new technologies. How do you advance your environment? How do you advance your company? Exactly

technology. And even if it's not automated manufacturing, everything else in terms of in terms of scheduling and managing their calendar and staying in touch with their friends, and interacting with social media, and so on, all of these things in so many ways are backed by, you know, backed by automation backed by artificial intelligence, they're, you know, it's natural for them when they come into a manufacturing operation, to want to work in

and around technology. So it really does create, then we become a destination employer when when young people can, and people of all ages can walk into a manufacturing plant and say, Wow, this isn't my prep my paradigm of manufacturing, this is technology. This is artificial intelligence. This is data analytics. It's really, it's an exciting, exciting place

to be. I've got one final question for you, Fabian, before we wrap up our time here on the tech ed podcast, and if I'm a manufacturer, and I want to get deeper into digital inspection, I'm recognizing that I can inspect my parts in process, I can perform final inspection in ways that I don't have to take for instance, a sample size of five parts out of a load and send them to a quality department where people are doing dimensional measurement or, or thickness testing, or

whatever it is that we're measuring in terms of defining tolerances and quality in a manufactured part. Where do I get started with digital inspection and in the types of solutions that you're going to be talking about today. So

cans. So I think mainly, the camera manufacturers are really, really good start to reach out, they have a lot of knowledge, they're willing to help. And then you look at some of the cobalt companies like in you are or FANUC, or other companies, also willing to help. And then you know, you bring him bring him together. And then of course, use use, you know, use this conference here today, I think that's the best way, best

way to network. But if I may add one, one other thing, which is I feel like really, really important for me. I mean, when we see smaller machine shops, I think it's very typical that the the owner, the CEO, Managing Director, whatever, General Manager, you know, is pretty involved in the day to day. And I think this is the key thing

going forward. When we look at automation for let's say, medium sized companies, especially big size companies, we need to get away a little bit from those constant, let's say boardroom meetings, return off, invest calculations important, don't get me wrong, but it's it's for me, it's about return on engagement. And return of engagement is really for the CEO for the general manager for key leadership. When it comes to automation, you gotta be part of

it. You just don't need to like always review PowerPoint, go on the shop floor, engage with employees, engage with suppliers, go to others and you know, and check with them, go to suppliers and check how they do it go to other companies who do similar work, but but spend more time engage more time in those topics. And I think the returns will be huge. It

happening. That is how you're going to learn your business, you're not going to learn it from a spreadsheet, you're not going to learn it in the boardroom necessarily, although there's some some benefits and some needs for that. But you learn your business going out on the floor thinking all the way back to the work that Taichi on what didn't in the 1940s and

1950s. about going to the manufacturing line watching the line operate finding out what's working and what isn't, whether that's with the supplier relationship, customer relationship, throughput on the shop floor, or in this case, figuring out where those use cases for automation are in how you can transform an entire culture of a company through some of these advanced manufacturing technologies. And we hear about new ones every

single day. So what we love talking about here on the tech ed podcast, and Fabian small can't thank you enough. By the way, the managing partner for bold promises delivered. I love the name of that company. And I know you're going to be doing tons and tons of good in the world of creating value for yourselves for your employees for the entire manufacturing sector, through the investments that you'll be placing in these really cool emerging companies. And I can't wait to hear more

about that. And I can't thank you enough for joining us here on the tech ed podcast.

The Tech Ed podcast. If you haven't already, subscribe, leave a review and if you liked this episode, share it with a friend. New episodes launch every Tuesday. So listen in next week.