FAGOR ARRASATE AND MONDRAGON UNIVERSITY STRENGTHEN THEIR ALLIANCE TO PROMOTE INTELLIGENT MANUFACTURING AND INDUSTRY 4.0

FAGOR ARRASATE and Mondragon Goi Eskola Politeknikoa (MU-EPS) have renewed their collaboration agreement to promote the development of intelligent manufacturing technologies in sheet metal stamping, processing and cutting systems.

After a decade of successful collaboration between the world-leading specialist in the design of forming and cutting lines, its Koniker R&D Unit and the Basque University have entered into a new agreement to join forces and exchange knowledge to carry out joint research projects. The collaboration will promote the development of intelligent steel sheet, aluminium and composite material processing systems that include remote monitoring systems. Specifically, work will be performed on the primary technologies in which Fagor Arrasate specialises, such as levelling, bending, cutting, forming, roll forming, robotics and automation for the automotive and steel industries.

The collaboration will focus on Industry 4.0 development, such as remote monitoring and data analysis solutions. Moreover, research in cyber-physical systems will be promoted to improve efficiency, reliability, robustness, intelligence, autonomy and remote interactivity of Fagor Arrasate products. All of this will be carried out without neglecting the development of advanced technologies and processes for the transformation of metals for new applications and sectors.

These developments will be incorporated in the stamping and processing systems, cutting lines and steel equipment offered by Fagor Arrasate. “This will ensure that our products are increasingly technological and competitive worldwide”, highlighted the company’s CEO, Unai López.

The key to the success of this alliance between the academic and business worlds lies in the transfer of knowledge for research, as explained by the director of the Higher Polytechnical School of Mondragon University, Carlos García “This agreement gives us the opportunity to carry out high-level research and transfer the knowledge gained from the research to the real world”, thereby obtaining “very rewarding” results for both parties. He also highlighted that this collaboration extends to the recruitment of qualified staff and conducting training sessions for researchers.

After 10 years of successful collaboration between the company and the academic institution, the agreement has been renewed because “the research projects are yielding results”, in the words of the Director of Koniker, David Chico. More than 50 joint research projects have been carried out over the last decade, among which 11 have been European. In addition, 4 theses have been read, there are another 4 on the way and more than 20 papers have been published in international congresses and JCR journals. “This demonstrates that the research teams are perfectly aligned and that our new agreement will be able to solve future challenges, said Chico.

The agreement also contemplates a commitment by both parties to promote the use of Basque in their collaboration. This includes ensuring that Basque is known by the human resources dedicated to project development and promotion of the use of Basque in theses and dissertation projects, as specified in the agreement.