Speaker 0 00:00:04 Hello, everyone. I'd like to welcome you to the robot nation podcast today. This is the podcast dedicated to advanced manufacturing capital equipment and the robotics and automation industry. We'll be covering trends and topics important to advance manufacturing and the industry and all interview guests. In our series of podcasts, we don't manufacturing is great. It brings all kinds of jobs into your community. And if you're good at it and motivated you have a job for life. My name is Jim Beretta, and I'm your host. I'm also president of customer attraction, industrial marketing based out of Cambridge, Ontario. I'd like to thank and acknowledge our partner today. The <inaudible> the association for advancing automation. <inaudible> is the umbrella association for the RIA AIA M CMA, and a three Mexico. These four associations combined represent all those 1300 automation manufacturers, component suppliers, systems integrators, and users, research groups, and consulting firms throughout the world that are driving automation forward.
Speaker 0 00:01:02 And we have a panel today. This is our first panel. I think this is going to be fun. Uh, I'm going to introduce first Matt Chevrolet. He's a partner at automation marketing, inc. And they're an Ohio based technical sales agency offering automation components from leading manufacturers. He's been involved in the industry since 1993. Matt resides in Dublin, Ohio with his wife and three kids. He holds a bachelor of science degree in business from the Ohio state university. And I'm going to also introduce grant Chevrolet grant and Matt are brothers. Of course, he's also a partner at automation marketing, inc. And they offer the same components from the leading manufacturers. And he's been involved with industrial automation for over 25 years. Grant resides in Rocky river, Ohio with his wife and two teenage sons. He holds a bachelor of science degree in business from the Ohio state university and a master's of science degree in engineering from Cleveland state university.
Speaker 0 00:01:56 I'd also like to introduce Chris round. Chris is the East central regional manager for EPS and robotics. He has over 25 years marketing and selling globally in the automation, packaging and SMT industries with a diverse background in conveyors, electronics, and robotics. He's currently on the robotics industry of America marketing committee. Chris resides in Cincinnati, Ohio with his wife, Linda and three kids all currently in college. Chris graduated with a bachelor of science degree from bowling green state university. So welcome to the podcast, Matt grant, and Chris, I'm really happy to have you. And I have to tell our audience a bit that we have a history we've known each other for a while. Chris and I go back a few more years and we're on the same marketing committee for the robot industry association. And I'm excited to have this conversation today. And today's podcast is about robot assembly automation, and we'll be talking about Ohio and Pennsylvania. And what other States do you cover bat and grant in your business? Well, we get a little bit into West Virginia as well, Jim, thanks again for having us today. I'd also like to introduce Epson robotics, uh, as part of this podcast today, and Chris, I'm going to ask you first kind of what's what's going on at Epson. Like you've got the other day, you and I were talking and you mentioned to me that you have over 300 models of robots
Speaker 1 00:03:15 Production. That's correct. And like Matt said, thanks Jim, for having us. This is great. You know, absence really made really been making robotics inexpensive and easy to buy these days with companies beginning to automate new companies that have maybe never bought before. Now, they can afford a robot we've gotten really, really inexpensive and actually are, are the one that we've been selling a lot lately is our T3 for around $7,500 that has it built a controller and a one 10 plugin. But big picture for Epson is it's just that the ease of use the integrated options that we have. And so we'll probably talk about many of those in this podcast, but I wanted to just give you an early sense as to what's going on with Epson
Speaker 0 00:03:59 And grant. I'd like you to introduce your company a little bit and some of the brands you represent, obviously Epson is one of them. Yeah. So automation,
Speaker 1 00:04:08 As you mentioned, we're a technical sales agency. Uh, we cover the entire state of Ohio, the Western half of Pennsylvania and West Virginia for her, most of our principals. So in addition to apps and we also get involved in automatic screw driving with Weber, indexing, and part handling with Weiss precision assembly presses with Schmidt, vibratory feeders with performance. And am I missing any dual strand pallet conveyors with a guideline that's that's correct. I've heard of guideline before
Speaker 0 00:04:50 The laugh a little bit because I, it has been a previous client of mine. Chris used to work there. So it's a, it's all one kind of happy automation community. So Matt and grant, I wanted to kind of start off with you a little bit and kind of find out what's happening and what's on your customers' minds a bit.
Speaker 1 00:05:07 So we're seeing a lot of, of first time customers into automation, bots in particular. And like Chris mentioned it with the trend being re you know, that the costs coming down, that the capabilities and ease of use, um, improving, we're seeing a lot of first time customers. Now, one of the, one of the things we're also seeing that come along with that comes along with that is they tend to underestimate what all is required, uh, when it comes to integrating a robot or integrating a piece of automation. So it's important that we do our job as supplier to educate these first time users on what, you know, what all they're getting involved with. And I, and I, and I like to make the analogy, uh, you know, that we're selling, let's say you're having your kitchen, a major kitchen remodeling project. We're selling the major appliances.
Speaker 1 00:06:02 So there's a lot, obviously that needs to be done beyond that. Are you comfortable and capable of handling what's required beyond that? You know, that's what that's a discussion that needs to be had. Yeah, I was going to say one of the interesting trends that we're seeing too is, uh, you know, as early as three, five years ago, primary justification for automation in general was, was based almost purely on, on volume, high volume and what we're seeing time and time again, I know Chris and I have been on several calls lately where, uh, they just need to find people and they can't find people. So what they're doing is, is taking people from an existing process, you know, switching them into different positions within the company where they need people that they, that they can trust and then implement robots, uh, you know, for those particular tasks, which tend to be pretty low volume tasks that the prior to the current state that we're in, uh, they would never have been able to justify, uh, you know, putting robotics into those operations.
Speaker 0 00:07:05 No, that's an interesting, interesting thing to see where people will spend more factory owners will spend money just to reduce ergonomic issues. Chris, we talked a little bit about integrated products. Can you tell us a little bit about the Intel IntelliFlux product?
Speaker 1 00:07:21 Sure. And I agree, you mentioned a little bit about this and it's a really neat product that we're offering. It's, it's basically, uh, a feeder that we have the robot, and of course we include our vision and with the three of those, the great thing is abstinence done, the heavy lifting here. No. So now the feeder and the vision, they all talk together. Uh, it's all totally integrated. And in the past, customers would have to set up the feed of communications. Did it feed her, tuning the vision, set up calibration programming and set up programming that, and of course optimize it. And now all customers have to do with, based on, like I said, the heavy lifting that we've done is simply the programming part tuning, and then a bit of parts adjustment at the end, and they're ready to go. And it's been very popular, uh, that can accommodate many different sizes as Greg was also mentioning. And currently right now we've got a two 40 in unit five 30, and we'll be coming out with a couple more options later in the fall. But, uh, it's, it's, it's been taking off. We've still, I think in our region here, we've probably sold the most out of, uh, to the most different customers in any of the other regions. So for this region here locally, it's been very, very popular.
Speaker 0 00:08:34 And again, you're seeing these are small parts, these are high nix environments, a medium volume or low volume.
Speaker 1 00:08:41 That's correct. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And you know, so in, in the past that, you know, bull feeder could, would be one type of part. And now because of the, just the many variations of parts that customers and our builders are having to, to, to, uh, to move the tray, feeder has been, uh, has worked out very good.
Speaker 0 00:09:07 Excellent. We talked a little bit about transformation departments and, uh, um, that you're seeing in some of your customers and some of your integrators, is that something that more and more companies are going to have, like, do you have a lab as well?
Speaker 1 00:09:21 We do. So it's really a very, it's an extraordinarily valuable tool. Uh, so we do, we keep several robots, um, at our distributor ship, uh, available along with vision and, and a feeder and from a testing feasibility training standpoint, like it's, it's powerful to have that capability. And we're finding a lot of customers are investing in robots for that same purpose, but to be able to, to have a robot, to try something, to get an idea as to whether it might work, maybe get a little bit of a cycle time study done with it is, is really, or to show, to show their customer or in our case to show our costumer an actual mockup. That is that's extremely valuable. Sorry, go ahead. No, I was just gonna say, Jen, these customers need feedback quickly. That's the other challenge that we have. So by having these resources locally, we can get feedback to these customers a lot faster than if we have to go back to corporate, which is where everything is coming in from North America. So it's a tremendous asset to have,
Speaker 0 00:10:34 We talked a little bit about the value of training and kind of retraining. And as it kind of goes with the whole, some of the customers may be new and not used to automation. Um, what, what are some of your thoughts on that
Speaker 1 00:10:47 From, from our experience we find, unfortunately that a lot of, a lot of customers seem to, to acknowledge at least initially the value of training, but they're almost kind of paying lip service to it. Uh, so it's really important to, to actually invest in the, the time and the, and the cost of training. And there does seem to be a little bit of reluctancy on the, on the behalf of the, the, the customer in some, in some cases to, to make that commitment. And, you know, really what I like to say is there's kind of a three time, three times multiplier effect when it comes to training versus the time you're going to spend, had you not attended training. And what I mean by that is if training is a week long and an absence case, if you have, if you want to be trained on the programming plus the vision, it's five days so a week.
Speaker 1 00:11:44 Um, I say, if you, if you choose not to attend that training, you're going to spend three times the amount of time toiling with the man through the manual in calls and emails to support it again, we're happy to support that standpoint, but the problem with that is oftentimes the customer becomes frustrated and they have a negative user experience as a result, really no fault of the suppliers. Uh, but that's what we see with training. It's really important. And it's, you know, and maybe we need to do a better job, and I'm sure, you know, to in explaining or in, you know, pleasing, I guess the customers, uh, the value of training is really oftentimes they don't realize it until it's too late. It's a tremendous drain on resources for both sides is really what it boils down to. Um, just, just to kind of tag along on what grant was saying there, uh, the amount of time that, that, that we have to spend with internal resources at Epson, and then the customer has to, uh, expend a lot of resources on their end as well. And then a lot of frustration comes about, and it can kind of turn into, uh, you know, a bad situation sometimes as well.
Speaker 0 00:12:56 So it's almost like a plant manager or project manager needs to put, you know, when they put the capital, the budget together for the equipment and they put the, uh, commissioning in as a cost, then they, they go, Hey, year two and year three and year four. We need to make sure that we always are investing in training because people leave and things happen. And you just need to make sure that you have your shift one and shift two and shift three, all
Speaker 1 00:13:18 Covered. That's crowded out. And I, and I think part of the challenge too, though, it goes back to the fact that these guys, a lot of these guys are spread really thin and they're vital to the, uh, to the day to day operations at these factories. So getting them out of the plant for a few days for parading, uh, can be, can be a challenge. And we understand that. So, I mean, that's why, you know, we'll work with customers. However, however we have to deliver that training, but really ideally we want to provide them with the most comprehensive training that we can. And in the end, that's going to make everybody's life a lot easier.
Speaker 0 00:13:58 Right? I think having a customer who knows a lot of what their products and processes and the software and such are, is probably your best customer say, let's talk a little bit about some of the unique applications of robots that you're seeing in your area.
Speaker 1 00:14:11 Sure. Um, so, so we have a very diverse product mix here in Ohio. I think traditionally, you know, we're thought of as heavy automotive, which we still are. We, you know, Honda of course has a major operations here as well as a lot of the other major automotive companies, but we do a tremendous amount of work, uh, in the medical device industry. Uh, we also do a tremendous amount of work with a lot of consumer product companies that reside here in Ohio. And that I would say the fourth segment that probably provides the largest, um, mix for us is just, you know, more or less independent private, uh, the manufacturers. Yeah, just to piggyback on that. We in Ohio, in particular in Western Pennsylvania, uh, we, we have a broad range of product types being assembled, but the applications themselves, interestingly enough, uh, the still the majority of the applications for, for robots involve picking in place, whether that be picking from, you know, to get a flex feed or loading an assembly machine or loading and unloading a CNC machine or a plastic injection molding machine or a testing machine, uh, the vast majority of the applications are pick and place.
Speaker 1 00:15:28 And these robots are very well suited for that application that, that not that doesn't limit us to that application. Certainly we get involved in dispensing and a lot of different applications, but, uh, by and large, uh, pick and place applications rule the day.
Speaker 0 00:15:48 Very cool. Um, so we kind of touched on a little bit of proof of principle. Have we beaten that to death, or do you want to talk about it?
Speaker 1 00:15:56 No, I think we can, we can expand on that. I think it's, uh, it's very valuable for a customer obviously to mitigate their risk, especially if we're talking about a systems integrator or a machine builder, they're, they're creating a unique product every time, you know, and it's, it's very challenging. Um, so whatever they can do upfront to reduce their, their exposure is of, is of great benefit. Um, so we talked about the labs, but one of the, one of the challenges with the lab is there's a lot of different robot, the range of robots. And we talked about this with Epson, there's over 300 different scare robot models alone. So how can you populate your lab? You know, you can see where I'm going with that. So, so w what's an alternative, well simulators. So like vision simulators have come a long way. What you can accomplish with a stimulator now is, is really amazing.
Speaker 1 00:16:48 So you can have a simulator bring in any robot that the supplier sells. You can write a program, you could bring in CAD data to build up your entire machine. You can do a feasibility cycle time collision avoidance all before you even purchase a robot. And really the, the value of that is, you know, you can bring in different robots. Okay. Bring in robot a, that might be a little less expensive. Does it do the job? Ah, not quite okay. Let's bring in another, the next model up. Okay. We're fine. We've got our safety margin. We know, with, with a high degree of confidence that robots are going to do the job and we can do an animation and email it to our customer.
Speaker 0 00:17:34 And that mitigation of risk of course, works both sides, right? It works for the customer. It works at, for the who's a manufacturer. And also for, um, uh, for the customer themselves, they reduce the risk and the price gets reduced for the integration. Let's talk about proof of principles, what it is and why this is important to reduce.
Speaker 1 00:17:52 Yeah. I mean, really it's, uh, their, their customer. Again, if we're talking about, and in a lot of cases, it's the machine builder who, who who's getting the most use out of the simulator. So, but I mean, their customers more comfortable, they're more comfortable, you know, we're happier. So it's really, it's a, uh, it's a win all around so that we're seeing a lot of, of more simulator use and simulators, different companies treat different simulators, different, some offered free and absent cases and absence cases free included with the software. Some companies, most companies actually charge a pretty good price for the sr, because again, it is a powerful tool.
Speaker 0 00:18:31 Talk a little bit about client successful applications. So, you know, with automation, you don't want to try to boil the ocean.
Speaker 1 00:18:38 Yeah. I think everybody has, uh, the, the level of, of capabilities in our industry is all over the place. Jim, um, both from a system integration standpoint and an end end user perspective. So really one of the, one of the key things for us, when we first go in and visit one of these customers, it's really important for us to determine what their level of expertise is. Because as granted indicated before, you know, a lot of these applications are basic pick and place applications, but a lot of them require machine vision and offend. If a customer doesn't have experience with vision guidance and it's a first time application can be real challenging. You had Jim, I like to say, you know, climb the ladder of complexity. And what I mean by that is start off with, with an application where the risk is relatively low and it's achievable. You know what I mean? You'll look good because that being the customer and then from there, they can build on that. But, but they're, you know, from time to time, I find customers that really they dive right in and the complexity is, you know, they bite off a little more than they can chew. So really ideally start off with, with a project or an application that is relatively straightforward, that you can cut your teeth on and then grow and gain experience. And then the next project, you know, work your way up that ladder.
Speaker 0 00:20:01 And that's a good segue into the next question I had is pre integrated automation solutions. So, you know, we see the benefit of it, but we just also the other side, um, what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 1 00:20:12 Yeah, I think again, you know, we're talking about, we so make the distinction between integrated and turnkey. And I think that with, with new customers, inexperienced customers, it's very important to make that distinction. And what I mean by that is integrated integrated features or integrated options are a tool to make your life easier, save you time to reduce complexity, but they're not turnkey. In other words, you're getting something in and the project yours, you know, the onus is on you to work with your supplier, to get the proper training, to learn what you need to know. And, uh, you know, ultimately the success of the project is on, is on your shoulders. Now, one example I often use is with vision. Um, new customers often overlook the, the importance of lighting and lighting makes or breaks a makes or breaks a vision application oftentimes, and there's a lot, there's a lot of different lighting techniques and lighting sources.
Speaker 1 00:21:23 And, you know, again, it's important to take the time and do your due diligence to understand that I've had first time customers, vision guided application, no lighting technique at all. And now you're, you know, you're, you're, you're vulnerable to ambient lighting. A light goes out in the plan or a light starts to dim on the floor and it could throw off your entire application. So that's an example. It's just, it's important. Understand integration are integrated versus turnkey. So word we're we're making, you know, robot companies in general, integrated options, vision guides, foresights parts, feeding, we're doing a lot to make your life easier, but your job is to take what we're giving you and make it turnkey.
Speaker 2 00:22:10 So the business of supplying automation devices has changed. What has changed for you in the last few years? Well, I would say,
Speaker 1 00:22:18 You know, definitely more support. And a lot of that goes hand in hand with the, all the new customers. We're getting a lot of all the medium sized companies, brand new automation, and they're nude automation because now you can get a robot for $7,500. And now that opens up a whole new world of opportunities for them, which is great. But again, it goes back to the training and the things, you know, these small companies might, you know, they're less likely to have the resources to send somebody to training. And I often tell people that I, it's not unusual for me to be working with a maintenance guy, integrated a robot, you know, cause of the owner of the company said, Hey, this is easy to use. So, uh, you know, it's up to you integrate this robot. And obviously he's a maintenance guy. He can't disappear for a week and now they're going to lean more on, uh, on the supplier.
Speaker 1 00:23:15 And really that's where a good distributor can be very beneficial to work with that company, to in that case where, you know, we need to be there to, to kind of, you know, again, arm and arm with them. It is a drain on resources from our standpoint. There's no doubt about that, but it's, uh, you know, in that case, in that particular example, um, there's really, uh, you know, we're not going to leave a customer hanging. We're going to provide the support regardless, but yeah, it's not ideal. It's not ideal. Yeah. And just to follow up on that a little bit, there's a tremendous amount of businesses out there still Jim, that, that, uh, have not implemented robotics yet. I mean, a lot of people would be surprised as long as robots have been out there. So we find ourselves dealing a lot these days with, with mom and pop shops and, and as grant, uh, referred to a little bit ago that when you, when you deal with these companies, they, they don't, they don't have the infrastructure that some of the larger traditional corporations, you know, have to, to, to handle these projects.
Speaker 1 00:24:18 So there is a lot of hand holding that goes on.
Speaker 0 00:24:22 Question is for Chris, uh, Chris, you obviously work with Matt and grant a lot. So how does the whole conversation start? Do they, you get a call or you get an inquiry from a customer and you and grant you'll, you might take Matt, you might take grant out to the
Speaker 1 00:24:38 Customer. We look at each, uh, opportunity that comes through a few different ways, you know, for our, for our team here, it's, it's, it's, it usually starts with geography. Uh, we start to look at the, uh, the project itself to see if, if we can get a sense as a systems integrator, I'm going to be, um, uh, an important part of it, but much of what we just discussed in your last question that really shows the value of where our, our partner integrators really come into play and they play an amazing, an amazing role. And so then we can determine, you know, the, the, if an integrator would be required, uh, of course we're looking at the actual project is still and the market itself, and of course the size of the project. So we're looking at, cause we have different partners that we work with that, that, that may entertain a million dollar projects or higher versus maybe even some as small as $50,000, you know, with maybe just a simple robot and some vision, whatever that may be a totally different builder. So we kind of just look at it that way. We generally meet on a weekly basis, um, at the end of the week, and just kind of talk about the week and talk about setting up the next week and see what we have to we've gone through. But we, we generally look at it that way and then we just kind of all attack the next week is unfolds for us.
Speaker 0 00:25:58 Well, it's very, been very interesting to kind of get an upbeat, I'm calling this episode, the feet on the street, uh, episode, uh, Matt and grant. Have we, did we miss anything? Is there anything else that you'd like to
Speaker 1 00:26:09 Jimmy, you've done a great job of touching on a lot of the different areas. I would say it's, uh, it's just a great time to be selling robots, supporting robots and buying robots there there's, there's lower cost options. There's more options just in general and greater capabilities. So it's, uh, it's an exciting time. It's going to be interesting to see coming out of this whole COVID, uh, you know, situation to how things are going to develop. You know, my, my feeling is just talking to customers, machine builders, and end-users, uh, that the emphasis going to be on more automation than, than ever before. And with that, and with Matt, that Matt absence has done an amazing job at trying to make this, this complexity less complex. If you will, you know, we're trying to take this even our software, which is a, uh, it's, it's just, it's just been created in a way that allows customers to be able to approach it in a comfortable way.
Speaker 1 00:27:11 I mean, it's, uh, so that's, that's something that, uh, is going to be very helpful as we have start to have even more and more people begin automation projects for the first time. Yeah, yeah. That, and that, that really is the goal. And the challenge is to improve, ease of use without reducing capability. Cause oftentimes you have a trade off you can't when you try to make something too easy, you lose the, you lose capability. And I know that frustrates a lot of engineers, so it's important. And again, if the challenge and Epson has done a tremendous job in making their product easy to use yet retaining the power and the capability of the system. And again, that, that is the challenge. And I wanted to thank you all three of you for showing up today, Matt grant, and Chris, I appreciate you taking time out of your day to chat with our audience, Matt and grant.
Speaker 1 00:28:11 How can people get in touch with you? You can reach us by email at info at automation marketing inc com, or you can reach us by phone at area code (800) 482-6880 and Chris round. How do people get ahold of you? Well, of course, that can be found on the, uh, the apps and websites, but if they want to give me a call, they can call me at five one three five five zero 28, 20 as well as Chris dot
[email protected] is my email. That's probably the best way to get a hold of me quickest. And I'd like to thank everyone for tuning into the <inaudible> robot nation podcast. Today. If you're a fan, please go to the iTunes website and give us a bunch of stars and we'll see you next time. Thanks for listening.
