Amar Kulkarni, Vice President – Sales, PolyWorks Software India Pvt Ltd
Please tell us about your company and its offerings.
PolyWorks India is a subsidiary of Innovmetric Logiciel, a Quebec City, Canada based company. As a global leader in the world of 3D metrology, inspection and reverse engineering, we have pioneered several technological innovations in the past 25 years and a growing testimony to our success is that we have close to 25,000 users world over who are using PolyWorks Universal 3D Metrology software every day for their inspection processes. Almost every Aautomotive and aerospace manufacturing company uses PolyWorks software in their inspection process and continues to increase the use exponentially.
Your views about the Indian Machine Tool Industry?
The Indian machine tool industry has seen multi-fold growth in the last 2 decades. This is a clear indication that India is manufacturing more than it ever did before. To compete with the global marketplace, Indian companies continue to invest boldly in latest technologies that help manufacture faster, better with higher accuracy. The Indian machine tool industry has a broad spectrum of customers to cater to, hence ensuring some kind of business success for every segment. This trend will continue, and I strongly believe the next 5 years will see Indian companies invest heavily in completing the cycle of automated and digital manufacturing processes. Paperless processes and cloud-based systems are here to stay. In a quick period, Indian companies will adapt to this. CAD/CAM is seeing a newer definition and the time has come for companies to understand that CAD/CAM is not limited to simply making 3D models anymore. The companies that adapt to 3D CAD/CAM based manufacturing and digital/cloud-based data management will stay in tune with the global industry.
What are the top trends you observe in the industry?
The buzz word surely is Industry 4.0. However, one needs to delve deeper and understand that it encompasses many elements. One trend will be fast adaptation to automated data management systems. PLM is already proof of how companies have automated data management in design, now this will venture strongly into Manufacturing and most importantly, into Inspection processes. Large OEMs constantly feel the need to monitor inspection processes within their companies and also within their TIER 1 suppliers’ ecosystem.
We are confident that customers will adapt to this at all levels. Sure, there will be teething issues, but here is where technology suppliers need to understand the responsibility of strong technical support and customer satisfaction.
What are the new machine tool technologies that are gaining acceptance in manufacturing industry?
I see remote monitoring and data management as a strong function of all leading machine tool manufacturers. Some years ago, this was a concept, now, customers are already using this. Additive Manufacturing (AM) is fast gaining acceptance. Customers understand that in several areas, it strongly complements traditional manufacturing. There will be a huge increase in newer machine tool applications to enable more than simply making parts (for e.g., best practices from machine learning etc). There will also be newer interest in inspection, validation and assembly guidance. Robotics will play a strong role in these changes.
How do you see the future of Indian Machine Tool Industry?
The future for Indian machine tool industry looks great. India has always provided a well-balanced playing field for global machine tool makers as well as local. The number of Indian companies locally manufacturing machine tools is increasing, but never enough. More needs to be invested in that segment.
What all products & services you are going to Display @IMTEX2019?
IMTEX 2019 will mark PolyWorks India celebrating 10 years in India (later this year we will celebrate 25 years of Innovmetric worldwide). We are showcasing our globally successful Metrology Suite Products consisting of PolyWorks Inspector, PolyWorks Modeler, Reviewer and Talisman. Each of these products are used by manufacturing organizations worldwide to plan, execute and review their part and assembly processes. However, IMTEX 2019 is special because we are showcasing our newly launched Collaborative Suite products for the first time to Indian customers. This brings our customers Inspection process into a complete digital process compliant with the needs of Industry 4.0 This is a new solution aimed at helping customers digitally manage their Inspection Data. It is solution that provides a complete and efficient digital data storage solution to manage all 3D measurement data. It also promises to significantly increase product-development efficiency by digitally interconnecting quality-control and product-engineering teams and providing them with real-time access to all 3D measurement data.
