EWPTE 2023: A Review by Happy Holden

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

Technical Conference

EWPTE provided 12 free technical presentations on May 17. I listened to these three:

1. The Effective Automation of Things by Schleuniger, Inc.
2. Simplify Manufacturing Automation to Overcome Skilled Labor Shortages by Zuken  & nVert
3. Trends in Automation and Digital Solutions for Wire Harness and EDS Systems by Komax Corp.

 Here are some things I learned:

• Why automate: Quality improvements, yields and defects reduction, increased complexity of your products, shortage of labor, when failures are too costly, traceability, and more
• Product creation/assembly/test EDA tools can provide organization, simplification, and documentation for increasing product complexities. These help in overcoming the persistent problems of inconsistent materials and parts, odd shapes, and multi-conductors, then increasing test and reliability performance
• Automation can relieve workplace labor shortages, tribal knowledge loss through retirements, and provide consistent quality and performance
• Most of the software is available from the cloud as is the hardware
• The future is virtual reality-driven cable constructions like Microsoft’s HoloLens
• Komax and Schleuniger were the largest exhibitors at the event and Komax has just merged with Schleuniger.  They exhibited many examples of automated wire harness fabrication and EDS systems driven by EDA files.
• Zuken was the only EDS vendor exhibiting

EWPTE Exhibits

The exhibits and expo were open Wednesday and Thursday. This was a lively set of exhibits but moderate in size. I would characterize it as very “mechanical,” as there were devices and machines to manipulate wiring and produce every imaginable cable configuration you could imagine. There were also many electrical test machines to verify the wire harnesses and their reliability/performance.

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