Plastics & Rubber World - November/December 2019 - 6

NEWS

AUTOMATION

Fanuc holds open house to
promote automation in UK
Coventry, UK - Automation
and process specialist Fanuc
has held its inaugural Open
House event at its UK headquarters, located in the Manufacturing and Technology Centre (MTC) at Ansty Park.
Fanuc completed the move
to its new 107,000 sq ft location in early 2017. As part of
this ﬁrst open house, the centre featured a series of process
automation demonstrations,
plus an example of the all-electric Fanuc Roboshot 450 injection moulding machine.
The three-day event featured panel discussions and
presentations on a series of
overarching topics, including
training and upskilling, barriers
to automation adoption and
the future of automation.
Speakers included David
Hughes MBE, deputy director
of apprenticeships at MTC,
and Bob Hinchcliﬀe, council
member at the British Automation and Robot Association
(BARA). Mark Pawsey, MP for
Rugby and Bulkington, was also
scheduled to speak.
While at the event, PRW
spoke with Tom Bouchier,
managing director at Fanuc
UK. He noted that the reason
for the open house was to
increase awareness of auto-

Fanuc Roboshot 450 IMM at the
company's Open House event
mation and how it could help
make UK manufacturing more
competitive.
"We've got everything we
need in this country, great engineers, great inventors, a great
workforce. But we sometimes
lack the investment strategy.
We see [automation] as a way
to help grow UK manufacturing," Bouchier said.
He added that manufacturers in this country should not
fear automation, but instead
they should fear not being able

to automate. "The automation
genie has been let out of the
bottle and you can't put it back
in. It exists, so either we use it
or someone else will."
In speaking about the current depth of automation in
the UK, Bouchier highlighted
how far the country has fallen
behind the global automation
average. "We're the only G7
country below the worldwide
average [in robotics penetration]. The average is about 99
robots per 10,000 workers,

we're at 91. I think Germany
is at 390 per 10,000 workers,
and they're continuing to grow
ahead of the worldwide average," he said.
In closing, Bouchier added: "The reason for the Fanuc
Open House is to try and get
rid of as many negative perceptions of automation as we can.
There's a list, the 10 reasons for
not automating, jobs, cost, etc.
They're an urban myth. I want
an opportunity to respond to
each of those points."

INVESTMENT

HSBC UK backs expansion
at Caledonian Plastics
Sheﬃeld, UK - Caledonian
Plastics has expanded its operations with the help of a 'six
ﬁgure' funding package from
HSBC UK.
Established in 1966, the
company manufactures a variety of parts and containers for
customers in the automotive,
building and leisure sectors.
New additions include a blow
moulding machine, sourced in

the Czech Republic, and an automated packing table.
The company is forecasting
that these will support a 20%
increase in production, while
reducing overall energy consumption. Moulding turnover is
expected to increase 10% over
the next 12 months.
In addition, the new equipment should support production using bioplastics, which

WWW.PRW.COM | NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2019

will help to 'meet demand from
industry and consumers'.
"We operate in a highly competitive market, so it is critical
that we keep investing in our
production facilities to ensure
we can meet new and existing
clients' demands," said John
Laing, MD at Caledonian. "With
HSBC UK's funding and guidance, we had the conﬁdence
and means to make this stra-

Ryan Slater, from HSBC UK
(left) and John Laing, MD of
Caledonian Plastics
tegic investment in our future."
The deal was part of HSBC
UK's £1.05bn lending fund supporting SMEs in Yorkshire.

http://WWW.PRW.COM

Plastics & Rubber World - November/December 2019

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