CELEBRATING
ENGINEERING
HEROES
MA Business, the UK’s
largest publisher of
engineering titles, is
launching a new initiative
to celebrate the people,
companies and technologies
that have been behind
engineering’s massive
contribution to fi ghting
the Covid-19 pandemic.
The publisher of iVT is
bringing this title together
with its sister engineering
brands to launch
#EngineeringHeroes,
a campaign that will
culminate in a special
one-off magazine later
this year, to honour the
unsung heroes helping
front-line workers. If you
wish to submit a story
or would like to support
the campaign visit www.
engineeringheroes.co.uk
A Safe Pair
of Hands
by Roberth
Jonsson
WHAT’S NEW
iVTInternational.com June 2020
CNH INDUSTRIAL PLEDGES US$2M
CNH Industrial is donating US$2 million to the CNH Industrial
Foundation whose goal is to provide fi nancial support to
charitable organisations operating in local education, health and
disaster relief during the Covid-19 pandemic.
This pledge is in addition to the company’s ongoing donations
of medical equipment supplies, including ventilators, personal
protective equipment, electrical generators and ambulances,
to healthcare providers in the regions in which the company
operates. To demonstrate solidarity with its workforce, the
CNH Industrial senior management team has elected to forego
temporarily part of its compensation. The company’s board of
directors has agreed not to take any of their remuneration for
the rest of year.
Covid future
WILL THERE BE MORE AUTONOMOUS
VEHICLES POSTPANDEMIC?
Like so many others these days I have been thinking a lot about
how Covid-19 will affect my business and I ended up bouncing
ideas (off myself of course) on how the development of the
autonomous off-highway machinery business will be affected. What will
happen once the dust has settled? Nobody knows, but it is not a stretch to
imagine that we will be facing signifi cant unemployment, with people eager
to take almost any job. The civil engineering business is unlikely to come to
a halt as governments and other state-run organisations will throw all
efforts at keeping the wheels of our economies turning. In other words,
there will probably be a great need for people in this area. The problem is
that we cannot just place an untrained person in an excavator and expect
them to start working. This person needs a lot of time to learn the craft and
handle the machine safely. Could autonomy help here?
One reasons for using semi-autonomous functions is that they make
it easier to perform tasks that usually require extensive experience to
perform professionally, like grading a slope. Semi-autonomy could mean
that with adequate basic and safety training inexperienced drivers could
start working effectively as machine operators sooner rather than later –
which would actually help get people into work faster.
The trend over the last few decades has been to move production to
low-cost countries in order to keep costs down. Will Covid-19 change this? I
believe so. I think people and countries have received a rude awakening to
the fact that we in the EU are highly dependent on other non-EU countries’
production capacity, and this is no different in the world of off-highway
machinery. In general, people are likely to buy more locally produced
products, and ‘Made in the EU’ or ‘Made in Sweden’ will be a stamp of
quality that will infl uence buying decisions. What does this mean in terms
of production of machinery? Probably more automation in production.
While the argument for locally produced goods will carry weight, cost
will always be a factor. How do we in the EU compete with low-cost
countries? By increasing effi ciency and introducing more automation in
production lines. Will this help in getting people into work? Yes, certainly.
At present all we can grasp is that none of us really knows what the
outcome of this period will be. I think (and hope) that autonomy, or semiautonomy,
will get a boost in off-highway machinery, as will automation in
industrial applications, post-coronavirus. Countries will recognise the value
of producing locally and will also invest heavily in new and proven
technologies to make this happen.
Autonomous machinery will most certainly be part of any future
scenario, the only question is: how fast and to what extent? iVT
Roberth Jonsson is a consultant in functional safety for mobile
machinery. Contact: Roberth.jonsson@zatisfy.se or www.zatisfy.se/ivt
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