NEWS

Fuji America Corporation, the North American provider of Fuji Machine electronic assembly equipment, announces the opening of its new Smart Factory Technology Center at the company’s Vernon Hills Illinois facility.

A ribbon cutting event was held in February and attended by 100 distinguished guests from the USA, Canada, Mexico, and Japan. It included a live demonstration of the company’s Nexim Factory Control Software, which enables machine-to-machine communication that unifies production activities across the entire PCB assembly line. Visitors were also treated to a panel discussion on Industry 4.0 hosted by industry leaders, and a firsthand look at Fuji’s Industry Partner contributions to the Smart Factory Concept. These partners included; Koh Young (AOI and SPI Inspection Systems), Speedline MPM (Screen Printers), Heller Industries (Reflow Systems), Flexlink (Material Handling Solutions), and Aegis (Software Solutions).

“The new Fuji Smart Factory marks a new era in the automation of electronics manufacturing,” stated Tom Zabkiewicz, Executive Vice President of Fuji America. “Our EMS and OEM customers have eagerly received this new technology as a game changer for manufacturing in North America.”

Fuji’s Nexim Factory Control Software is an enterprise-wide solution for managing programming, scheduling, inventory management and real-time factory analytics, as well as ERP integration. Automation is at the heart of the Smart Factory concept, as it enables feedback at key process points to achieve higher yields faster and more accurately.
“The Smart Factory demonstrates how the electronics manufacturing process can be dramatically improved with advanced machine-to-machine communications, closed-loop feedback between different OEM systems, and collection of data from all parts of the process,” stated Tony Picciola, Service and Software Systems Manager of Fuji America. “While the Smart Factory does automate many critical tasks, it does not eliminate the need for skilled and experienced operators to monitor the assembly line.”

The Fuji Smart Factory Facility is currently open at the company’s facility in Vernon Hills, Illinois, USA, and will be used to demonstrate and continually develop new processes and technologies, such as Google Glass wearables, to Fuji’s North American customer base.