Don’t miss this who couldn’t visit IMTS 2018!（5／5）

14 Japanese companies attracted the greatest attention from visitors（5／5）

 “IMTS2018”, Chicago Show, was held for six days from September 10 to 15, 2018, at McCormick Place in Illinois, U.S.

The total of 129,415 visitors visited there.

Automation solution especially attracted attention in IMTS 2018.

In this article, we will report the main exhibitions of 14 Japanese FA manufacturers which have had a high presence in the North American market. The reports will be posted in 5 times for people who couldn’t visit IMTS 2018.

Significant attention to digitization technologies/ Makino Milling Machine

Makino Milling Machine received the greatest attention in digitization technologies such as IoT and AI.

The demonstrations of machining were carried out while the machine and the person have conversations with each other in the center of the booth. It attracted many visitors.

Makino Milling Machine installed a voice recognition system “ATHENA” developed by a US start-up company on the machine.

The machine understands the natural language of a person and it is a future-minded  solution that can manipulate machines with just words like “Google Home”.

Nearly 20 machines were used to be displayed, but only 7 actual machines are displayed this time and “communication between machines and people” was put emphasis.

The exhibition method differed from the conventional one, but president Shinichi Inoue said that they had good reactions.

Automation of cylindrical grinding and internal grinding／Okamoto Machine Tool Works

Okamoto Machine Tool Works connected the eternal cylindrical grinding machine and the internal cylindrical grinding machine with a robot to automate process of the grinding and internal grinding. The system was built by affiliated corporation in U.S.

“We also wanted to promote the ability to assemble an automated system at our company,” the representative says.

They said that Okamoto recruited a person who could handle robots at affiliated corporation in U.S.

First show of barrel tool / DIJET

DIJET first showed a solid type barrel tool for mold machining. The barrel tool is a tool with a peripheral arc shape in a large circular arc shape. It realizes highly efficient machining with 5-axis MC and dedicated CAM. “There is a strong need for the US to use 5-axis MC for mold machining compared to Japan, so we first opened up barrel tools in the US,” said Ayumu Ikezumi, president.