Like most things in life you have your early adopters, mainstream buyers, and your technology laggards. So how do you comfort those with automation phobia when they become members of a high profile project? In short it takes a lot of patience and communications to help eliminate the perceived risk.

I’ve seen lists like this which seem to be an accumulation of ideas without relative value. Automating with robots is an economic decision with value associated with it. I wanted to develop a list that is cohesive and direct and paints a story when viewed collectively. How ironic I start with a reason with no value…

I had the privilege last week, along with my friend and colleague Mark Gaskill, to speak at the Annual Warehouse Education Research Council Conference in Anaheim California. Our topic was “Breakthrough Material Handling Technologies”. This is the 3rd year that I have put together this presentation, highlighting new technologies and exciting uses for existing technologies. With Mark’s help, this was – in my humble opinion – our best presentation of the latest and greatest distribution technologies available on the market. Although the session was a multi-media presentation and lasted about 90 minutes, I will summarize some of the highlights and what I found to be the most interesting topics…

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Steve Poeling, a Robotics Controls Engineer with BMH Robotics, was featured in the December cover story of Food Engineering Magazine. The article entitled “Starbucks Goes From Green Beans to Green Plants” talks about Starbucks manufacturing standards and Bastian’s involvement in their Robotic Controls integration.

BMH Robotics is pleased to announce the addition of Ken Tinnell to the team! Ken recently joined the group as the Robotics Engineering General Manager.

Ken’s most recent experience was as the Senior Director of Applications Engineering with Avery Dennison’s RFID Division. In this role he was responsible for leading the applications department with responsibility for architecture, application development, systems engineering and technical marketing. He led the systems team to deliver process improvement breakthroughs and increased manufacturing throughput by 25% while improving the quality of finished products based on customer feedback. Ken also spearheaded customer usage tests and created the division’s first Project Management Center of Excellence Program (PMI-based).

Ken holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Kentucky, as well as a Master of Science in Industrial Engineering and an MBA from the University of Cincinnati.