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Assembly Technology 2002 Shows a Positive Sign for the Manufacturing Industry
October 15, 2002 |Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
Norwalk, Conn. -- Assembly Technology Expo held its 23rd annual exhibition and conference September 24 through 26, 2002, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, Ill.
Sponsored by ASSEMBLY Magazine, the three-day exhibition had impressive traffic with 12,048 industry professionals looking to evaluate the latest equipment and solutions, learn and share ideas, and network with industry resources. Most of the engineers and company representatives in attendance were decision-makers with purchasing power who had solid business needs necessitating that they attend.
This year, show attendance was up 5 percent over last year's event. Nearly 700 companies exhibited the latest solutions available from automated assembly systems, workstations, adhesives and fasteners, to wire processing, robots and motion control devices for both general assembly and electronics assembly. Many exhibitors commented on the how the quality of business transactions taking place on the exhibition floor had surpassed expectations.
Assembly Technology Expo again partnered with the industry's top organizations to develop an impressive cutting-edge educational conference. The 2002 program featured nearly 40 workshops and technical sessions prepared and presented by the Adhesives and Sealants Council (ASC), the Edison Welding Institute (EWI), the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) and Wiring Harness Manufacturers Association (WHMA).
The conference ran from September 23 through 26. Running alongside the Assembly Technology Expo Conference again was the co-located SMTA International Technical Conference featuring more than 30 tutorials and workshops, and more than 100 technical papers for professionals in the surface mount, advanced packaging and related industries. The SMTA also presented several symposiums and held their Annual Meeting/Luncheon.
Two highlights were the standing room only keynote presentations by senior manufacturing executives from General Motors and Ford Motor Co. The show opened Tuesday morning with Gerald L. Elson, vice president of General Motors and General Manager of GM Vehicle Operations presenting "Emerging Technologies in Automotive Manufacturing." Elson discussed how the application of digital and wireless technologies is helping vehicle assembly become more efficient and cost effective, improve quality and bring new products to market.
Day two of the show began with "Technology as an Enabler for People and Quality," presented by Anne Stevens, vice president, North America Vehicle Operations for Ford Motor Co. Stevens discussed how Ford is abandoning the traditional production practices and will build multiple vehicle configurations on the same assembly line.
Another popular special event was the Lean Manufacturing Forum presented by ASSEMBLY Magazine. Again, a standing room only audience was on hand to hear manufacturing executives from five manufacturers discuss the challenges and issues involved in setting up and managing a truly lean production environment. The companies whose senior executives shared their insights were Boeing, Deere, Freudenberg, Ross Controls and Toyota.
The centerpiece of the Electronics Assembly Pavilion was the 10th appearance of the EASi Line, the Electronic Assembly Suppliers initiative Line coordinated by Electronics Manufacturing Solutions Inc. of Indianapolis, Ind. The fully conveyorized manufacturing line demonstrated the innovative technologies available from ATExpo electronics exhibitors and how they can be used in conjunction with each other. Attendees watched as a working electronic Tic-Tac-Toe game was assembled using the latest electronics assembly technologies. Participating equipment companies included A.P.E. South, Aqueous Technologies, Cookson Electronic Assembly Materials, Data I/O, Dynapace, Factoryware, FEINFocus USA, Heller Industries, IMPELL, Minami America, Motorola, MYDATA Automation, Production Basics, ProModel and Samsung Technology.
For more information on Assembly events, visit www.atexpo.com.