EDITORIAL ROUNDUP

Entries Now Open For Automate UK Awards 2026

Entries are now being accepted for the Automate UK Awards, the annual recognition event celebrating excellence in automation, robotics and industrial vision. The organisation also announced that comedian Frank Skinner and soul singer Heather Small will perform at the presentation. The deadline for entry submissions is 17:00 on 7 August. Winners will be announced at a gala dinner on the second evening of the UK’s biggest processing and packaging machinery, robotics and industrial vision exhibition, PPMA, which takes place at the NEC, Birmingham, from 22-24 September.

More information www.tinyurl.com/3sxy3b9h

Whitehouse Wins Mitsubishi EDM Agency in UK

Whitehouse Machine Tools has been appointed the UK sales and service agent for Mitsubishi Electric’s range of wire-cut and die-sink EDM machines. The strategic partnership represents a significant expansion of the agent’s portfolio, which currently includes notable machine tool brands such as Brother, Spinner and Biglia, spanning machining centre and CNC lathe technologies.

As part of the new agency agreement, Scott Elsmere and Dean Barnes, have both joined the team at Whitehouse Machine Tools to ensure seamless continuity of service. Experienced engineers with decades of technical sales experience and applications expertise in the manufacturing industry, Elsmere and Barnes have recently been engaged in the sales of Mitsubishi Electric EDM machines.

More information www.wmtcnc.com

£1.9 Million Investment

Northwest SME manufacturers are investing £1.9m in digital technologies to boost productivity, create jobs and accelerate growth, with support from Made Smarter. Some 30 manufacturers have secured a combined £604,000 of funding through the Government-backed technology adoption programme. Among them are businesses producing everything from industrial machinery to advanced engineering components. The latest tranche of projects includes investments in automation and robotics, digital inventory systems, production monitoring, cloud-based platforms, and advanced manufacturing technologies.

More information www.madesmarter.uk

50 Years of Support

Mclennan is celebrating 50 years of supporting the UK automation, manufacturing and science sectors with precision motion control technology, engineering expertise and technical support. Founded in May 1976, the company has established itself as a specialist partner to OEMs, machine builders, systems integrators and specialist equipment designers requiring motion solutions for industrial and research applications. Notably, the company’s very first customer, Metham Engineering – now part of the Will-Burt Company – remains a customer to this day.

More information www.mclennan.co.uk

Making Digital Leaps With ISO STEP Standards

Sandvik Coromant has participated in a successful research project for the Standard for the Exchange of Product (STEP) data. Together with GKN Aerospace Engine Systems, Chalmers University of Technology and Fraunhofer Chalmers Research Centre for Industrial Mathematics, the working group has developed a collaboration environment and applied it to the MRO process for complex metal parts. The results demonstrate how ISO standards for digital manufacturing offer a foundation for interoperable, model-based data exchange and execution across the entire repair value chain.

More information www.tinyurl.com/muez8r9t