News

It is with great anticipation that I take on the role of new Chairman of the Board of Automation Region. We have exciting times ahead of us with high goals and ambitions. In five years, we will be Europe's leading innovation environment for automation. It is a bold vision - and to succeed will require a great deal of courage, skill and energy.

As the industry is digitized, the pressure for coordination and cooperation on standards and interoperability between different systems increases. In a joint initiative, RISE, the Royal Institute of Technology, Lund University, the Swedish Institute for Standards and Automation Region are therefore establishing a new knowledge platform for standardization in the digitalized industry.

If I may wish for anything, it is that more of us take the opportunity and think about the future with AI. Take the opportunity to discuss with your colleagues and friends. Dare to ask questions about what happens next - after the smartphone and beyond.

In 1996, Sweden took a real step within information technology with a home PC and large investments in broadband. Around 2007 the smart phones came and accelerated the development of digital services and business models. 2020 was the year when our meetings and meeting places went digital and we learned that teleworking could function really well.

In collaboration with Science Park Borås, Automation Region is investigating new ways to automate small-scale textile production. The collaboration creates opportunities for automation companies to find new business opportunities within the textile industry, where there is great development potential for automated manufacturing processes.

On December 8^th, Automation Region arranged a digital workshop on automated product configuration - the process of customizing a product. Representatives from about 20 companies and organizations worked on a fictitious case based on a manufacturing company that wants to modernize its product configuration environment.

A large part of Automation Region's activities, projects and initiatives are based on the newly established concept of IndTech. The term describes the development that is taking place in the industry right now, where existing automation and IT systems are being strengthened with new digital solutions. Swedish companies are judged to have a good starting point in this rapid structural transformation, but there are also challenges.

Since the end of World War II, the United States has developed a successful ecosystem of partnership between business and government. Extensive federal R&D efforts have led to breakthroughs such as the Internet and GPS technology, which in turn form the basis of leading US tech companies and platforms. Most of these companies conduct most of their development from Silicon Valley, where they, together with universities such as Stanford and UC Berkeley, have played an important role in the region's development.