Life Science Automation

Situation

An industry leading Life Science company had been trying to automate a key element of its product assembly for 7 years without success. Their product, a Class II medical device, requires a process to insert a component with the thickness of two hairs into a hollow member that is not much larger. Currently workers must insert the component by hand with the assistance of magnifying lenses. As a result, production efforts have been constrained by this slow and tedious process which causes operator fatigue and creates potential for damaged product. Multiple companies attempted to provide an automation solution without success.

ACTION

We recommended that our customer first develop a prototype system to mitigate risk before proceeding to full production automation. After developing an advanced vision system to work with the required precision, Automation^nth rapidly prototyped automation designs using digital twins to save the customer time and expense. After validating the concept would work with a successful prototype, Automation^nth went on to produce multiple fully automated production machines for the customer.

RESULT

After our customer struggled for 7 years to find a successful automation solution, Automation^nth successfully passed the factory acceptance test on the prototype system only four months after receiving the customer’s Purchase Order. The customer provided feedback that after their testing, “the assembly resulted in the cleanest data ever generated in this application.”