A company such as igus develops hundreds of new products a year, and most of them flow out of their best R&D resource: their customers. Artur Peplinski, CEO of International Business at igus, told Power & Motion the company is seeing from customers a greater request for cabling and intelligent, or Industry 4.0, solutions. As such, the company is working to develop products which meet these customer needs.
Introduction of the company's i.Sense technology is an example of an intelligent solution Peplinski noted igus developed to benefit customers. It can predict component failure, helping customers be more proactive about replacing the part before it fails and causes unplanned downtime. He explained the technology sends a signal to either the customer or igus so appropriate action can be taken to replace the part before downtime occurs.
Other key aspects customers are looking for are cost-effective solutions and a reliable supply chain said Peplinski. Something he said has changed a lot in the past 2 years is customers thinking more about whether or not they can get something locally. "We see a lot of changes in this mindset," he said.
To meet these customer needs, Peplinski said igus works to supply very efficient solutions for the lifetime of a customer's application which is benefitted by the inclusion of more intelligent solutions.
