Lantek, a specialist in management software solutions for the sheet-metal industry, has signed a partnership agreement with Turkish fibre-laser manufacturer Nukon to supply Lantek software with its machines worldwide. Nukon’s range of fibre-laser machines is available in power levels up to 6 kW with an option for linear drives that give acceleration of up to 3 G. The company also manufactures tube-cutting fibre lasers, and waterjet, plasma and oxygen-cutting machines. Over 500 Nukon machines are installed worldwide.

Following the partnership agreement, Nukon customers will be able to benefit from the network of offices and distribution channels that Lantek has around the world.
Francisco Pérez, OEM channel director at Lantek, says: “Collaborating with Nukon will enable us to bring our software, skills and local knowledge to a wider customer base, and will help Nukon by giving it support in international markets.”
For further information
www.lanteksms.com www.nukon.com.tr

Orders received by the German machine tool industry in the first quarter of 2017 were 6% up on the previous year, reports the VDW. Domestic demand rose by 2%, while overseas orders grew by 8%. The latter figure was boosted by a high increase of 23% in orders for machine tools from European countries. The VDW also reports a 13% increase in metal-forming technology orders. This rise in demand came both from home and abroad. Machining equipment orders, however, which represent about 70% of the total, only rose by 3%.
For further information www.vdw.de

My Viet Industries has ordered a twin-stand reversing cold mill CCM (Compact Cold Mill) and a push-pull pickling line from SMS group’s Indian subsidiary Esmech Equipment. The new plants, installed at the Pho Noi A Industrial Park in the Hung Yen Province of south Hanoi, are scheduled to be put into operation in the autumn of 2017.

The CCM, in six-high design with CVCplus for strip profile, contour and flatness control, will be designed for an annual production capacity of 400,000 tons. The mill will roll low-carbon steel strip in widths of up to 1250 mm and minimum final gauges down to 0.15 mm. Maximum rolling speed will be 1400 m/min. High technology components, such as the bending block cassettes and the CVCplus shifting mechanism, will be supplied by SMS group from Germany.
For further information www.sms-group.com

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel visited the Schunk pavilion at the recent Hannover Messe exhibition and learnt about the future of smart production. She looked on while the managing partner/CEO of the family-owned company, Henrik Schunk, presented smart gripping modules that enable direct human/robot collaboration (HRC).

In other news, the company has received the Hermes Award for its Schunk JL1 co-acting gripper, the world’s first intelligent gripping module for HRC that directly interacts and communicates with humans. “The JL1 is a decisive step on the way to highly flexible handling scenarios for Industry 4.0 and, therefore, for smart production,” says Schunk. It was the first time in the history of the Hermes Award that the trophy has been awarded for a gripping module.
For further information www.schunk.com

ABB and IBM have announced a strategic collaboration that brings together ABB’s digital offering, ABB Ability, with IBM Watson Internet of Things cognitive capabilities to unlock new value for customers in industry. Customers will benefit from ABB’s domain knowledge and portfolio of digital solutions combined with IBM’s know-how in artificial intelligence and machine learning. The first joint industry solution powered by ABB Ability and IBM Watson will bring real-time cognitive insights to the factory floor. “This combination moves beyond current connected systems that simply gather data, to industrial operations and machines that use data to sense, analyse, optimise and take actions that drive greater uptime, speed and yield for industrial customers,” says
ABB CEO Ulrich Spiesshofer.
For further information www.abb.com