Topics this time: digital transformation in manufacturing course, exoskeletons, electric car production, and more money for robotics and automation startups.
🆕 Digital Transformation Course: I’m super excited to launch the first course about digital transformation in manufacturing. This course is a 8 week, workshop-style program, with 2-4h commitment that fits your full time job. The curriculum and content of the course are based on many interviews with experts. Instructors of the course have worked at leading manufacturing companies such as Mercedes Benz, ZEISS, Dürr, Siemens, and others. Apply here or if you want to do me one favor - refer it to people who could benefit from it.
👪 Community for Innovation Managers: We crossed 100 members last week and I will invite more people over the next months. You can join the waitlist here or forward it to somebody you think should be part of this global community. As a reminder, this community is designed for people who work on the digital transformation in manufacturing companies, coordinate and drive digitization projects, and scout new ideas. Please note, building a diverse community is a key priority for me.
Got a friend or colleague interested in the future of manufacturing? Help me spread the word by sharing the newsletter if you like it!
⚒️ Northvolt struck a partnership with Volkswagen and receives $14bn battery cell order.
Speaking of Volkswagen, the Swedish-based battery cell manufacturer Northvolt received a $14bn battery cell order from Volkswagen for the next 10 years. Northvolt has now secured more than $27 billion worth of contracts for its battery cells. This allows the company to expand its gigafactory in Sweden to achieve economies of scale that will help to decrease costs and to lower the environmental footprint.
It’s noteworthy that Volkswagen is also an investor in Northvolt and that Peter Carlsson, one of Northvolt’s co-founders, has worked several years at Tesla as VP of Supply Chain.
💰 Trumpf acquired Lantek to expand its software business.
The family-owned software specialist Lantek has been developing sheet metal software for 35 years and just got acquired by Trumpf, a German industrial machine manufacturing company. Trumpf will use the software to expand its software business and offer sheet metal processing software that is independent of the machine manufacturer. I guess this is also the reason why Lantek will continue to operate under its current name. The price of the acquisition has not been disclosed.
👉 Personal opinion: Manufacturing companies that acquire software companies is something I expect to see more in the next few years. As we all know, "Software is eating the world" and is becoming more important as manufacturing companies digitize their offerings. I've written about the M&A activity in the European Manufacturing Industry a few months ago. Looking at the results, manufacturing companies have also acquired a significant amount of consulting companies to strengthen their consultative offering and digital expertise. More to come.
💉 BioNTech’s Marburg manufacturing site just got the approval to manufacture its Covid-19 vaccine.
🏭 Apple is about to make a deal with Hyundai-Kia for autonomous vehicles.
There has been a lot of speculation about the “Apple Car” in the last few years. According to multiple sources, Apple is close to finalizing a deal with Hyundai-Kia to manufacture an Apple-branded autonomous vehicle in Georgia (US). In theory, Apple could partner with different automotive players. However, finding one that has manufacturing capabilities in the US and lets Apple control the software and hardware is not easy. That’s why Hyundai-Kia is interesting which seems to be open to that. Hyundai-Kia could also accelerate the development of its own autonomous and electric vehicle plans through that partnership. No agreement has been reached but this is going to be interesting to watch. Tapping into the $10 trillion (!) mobility market unlocks huge potential for Apple that owns roughly one-third of the $500bn smartphone TAM.
🎮 Amazon is expanding its elements of gamification for warehouse employees.
Amazon introduced elements of gamification for its warehouse employees in 2019 and is now expanding the program to warehouses in 20 states. The program remains completely optional but workers at the station can now choose from one out of six games. One game was described as “Tetris, but with real boxes” according to this article. Some workers like the games because they can help cut down on the tediousness and repetition of tasks. Some workers are afraid that these games will push employees to work faster and thus risking injuries.
🧐 Autodesk shamelessly replaced nTopology logo on social media
Katana has developed a Plug'n'Play ERP specifically for smaller manufacturing companies. It helps these companies to track raw material costs, inventory movements and to get a status overview. It also offers integrations into tools such as Shopify, WooCommerce, and QuickBooks. Shopify is very interesting for Katana since a boutique manufacturer that sells on Shopify can directly pull orders from Shopify into Katana. At the same time, being listed in the Shopify AppStore is a great distribution channel for Katana.
🤑 Full Speed Automation raised a $3.2M seed round led by HCVC.
The former Head of Core Automation Engineering at Tesla, Luc Leroy, has raised a $3.2M round for his new company Full Speed Automation. The round is led by HCVC and will help the company to speed up the development effort for its software platform. The platform can be described as a “no-code automated manufacturing platform” that will help manufacturing companies to simplify “data acquisition and enable production monitoring with real-time telemetry”. The platform can be compiled and deployed in seconds and integrates into existing production lines. As you see, the company name speaks for itself and it’s all about full-speed automation.
🤑 First Resonance adds Blue Bear Capital as a new investor.
A SPAC is a “Special Purpose Acquisition Company” and formed to raise money through an initial public offering to buy another company (read more here if you’re interested).
Below is the investment thesis from Chamath Palihapitiya who helps to bring Berkshire Gray public (see Tweet here):
🤑 Nimble Robotics raised a $50M Series A led by DNS Capital.
Nimble Robotics is one of the companies that benefit from the record growth in eCommerce and fulfillment. The company is developing robots that can pick, pack and handle products within warehouses. To deploy more robots to its customers, Nimble Robotics has a $50M round. The company counts several Fortune 500 fulfillment centers to its customer base and was founded from the Artificial Intelligence labs at Stanford and Carnegie Mellon.
🤑 AM Ventures targets €100M fund to invest in 3D printing startups.
AM Ventures is a new Munich-based fund that focuses on investing in industrial 3D printing companies. Until today, the fund has already invested in 15 startups across 6 countries and is targeting an initial closing of €100M. The main company and major shareholder behind the fund is Langer Group, a German mold, and tool manufacturing company.
Shopfloor IT Summary
Together with Marco Holst from ZEISS, we hosted a workshop for our Future of Manufacturing Community about shopfloor IT, the basic terms, historic development, and future outlook. Here are the main takeaways from our discussion we had after the workshop:
Automation: In many cases, factories are still far away from automation and are struggling with basic automation. Many people see the term “industry 4.0” more as a pure marketing term. The complexity on the shop floor is a big risk and makes it hard to quickly implement new solutions. It’s similar to how banks have been (and some still are) running on the technology they started with 30 years ago. In addition, factories are not only about machines since humans play a very important role. Flexibility is often used as another argument against automation.
Enterprises vs. SMEs: while large enterprises in manufacturing invest significant resources in the digital transformation, projects can take a long time. SMEs might be faster but sometimes lack the knowledge or resources for a big transformation. Also, changing a running system can be such a big change for SMEs that people are too afraid of it.
Machine data: when it comes to getting data from machines people had very different experiences. One person who is building an MES in additive manufacturing mentioned that it is fairly easy to get data from machines. On the opposite, one person working at a traditional discrete manufacturing company mentioned that it’s very hard to get data from machines and some machines are still not connected to the software running in the factory.
Industry 4.0 - Reinventing the Factory Stack
There are now in total ca. 450 companies in the landscape, which I just updated in March. More to come soon.
