Sydney company Q-CTRL has raised $35 million (US$25 Million) in a Series B financing round Led by Airbus Ventures. The company, whose software and hardware reduces noise and error in nascent quantum computing systems, will use the funds to develop new data-as-a-service markets powered by quantum sensing for acceleration, gravity, and magnetic fields. Airbus Ventures…
Today our editorial series, Leadership in factory automation, looks at the quintessential dilemma, and opportunity for Australian manufacturing – flexible mass manufacturing for the large number of product types needed to satisfy Australia’s diverse local markets. Here Peter Roberts profiles Electrolux Home Products. Electrolux Home Products single Australian factory is what Australian manufacturing has been…
In situ goal gasification developer Leigh Creek Energy has signed an offtake agreement that will allow it to proceed to finance its coal to gas to urea plant at the former Leigh Creek coal field in South Australia. The company’s executives travelled to Korea to sign a heads of agreement with Daelim which plans to…
CSIRO has launched a $12 million Collaborative Intelligence (CINTEL) Future Science Platform which aims to move beyond machines replacing people or automating their jobs, and instead to create teams that maximise the benefits of both human and machine intelligence. CSIRO said that one of CINTEL’s first projects would draw on the expertise of CSIRO’s Robotics…
Global defence technology and engineering company QinetiQ is to collaborate with the Australian Missile Corporation of SME defence companies created on the back of the Australian Government’s plan for a domestic guided missile manufacturing enterprise. QinetiQ has been entrusted with testing and evaluating high-tech weapons systems from small arms to ballistic missiles for AMC, a…
Bulk gases, chemicals and equipment supplier BOC and Optimal Group are to explore the development of Australia’s first waste to fuel bioLNG facility. The companies have signed an MOU and will investigate the potential for Optimal’s subsidiary, Optimal Renewable Gas to build a $55 million, 2.4 TJ/day waste to biogas plant adjacent to BOC’s micro-LNG…
Wire arc-based additive manufacturing goes back to the 1990s, but is only starting to realise some of its commercial potential. Adelaide-based AML3D is one of the global leaders in commercialising this technique, which uses a combination of software, robotics and wire arc welding as a heat source, melting wire and depositing it, layer by layer,…
In the second day of Leadership in factory automation, Daen Simmat looks at why the “robots versus jobs” rhetoric presents a false choice. As history shows us, for example with ATMs being introduced at banks, existing jobs will be improved and new ones created through adopting technology.
Defence contractors Varley Rafael Australia (VRA) and Thales Australia are to explore future Australian production of the RAFAEL SPIKE family of guided weapons, as part of their support for the establishment of a Guided Weapons and Explosive Ordnance (GWEO) Enterprise. VRA is a joint venture Australian engineering company, VARLEY GROUP and guided weapons manufacturer RAFAEL…
Heavy engineering company Austin Engineering has passed a milestone of 1,000 iron ore truck bodies delivered to mining company Rio Tinto. According to a statement from the Western Australian government celebrating local content in projects in the state — Austin’s truck bodies use 100 per cent local suppliers — the partnership between Austin and Rio…
