In the searing heat of Las Vegas, Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence (HMI) recently hosted its HxGN LIVE 2019 event that was attended by more than 3000 customers, partners, journalists and industry experts. MTD magazine takes a look at the event that will be coming to the UK on the 1st and 2nd of October.

OK, so the HxGN LOCAL Smart Manufacturing UK two-day event won’t be taking place in Sin City at the Venetian hotel, but the Belfry Hotel and Resort will offer equal prestige with keynote speaker Sir Ranulph Fiennes sharing inspirational stories from his international expeditions whilst ‘The Stig’ will form part of the evening entertainment. Hexagon’s keynote speaker, Manufacturing Intelligence President Mr Norbert Hanke, will pick up the reins with ‘Smart is Hiding in Plain Sight’ – an insightful nudge of encouragement for manufacturers to discover the untapped smart potential in their processes.

The event will also include a variety of speakers addressing topics such as automation, autonomous mobility, smart factories and what will be required to navigate future technologies and the economy. Let’s not forget the event will also be an opportunity to absorb the latest software innovations that will include the recent launch of WORKNC JAVELIN, VISI, NCSIMUL, RADAN and EDGECAM 2020.0 Versions whilst the metrology division will be promoting the latest innovations such as the Leica Absolute Tracker ATS600 and AT960, the Tigo and Optiv, the RA8 Arms and the Tesa products to name a few.

The Belfry Hotel won’t have the size or scale of the world’s third-largest hotel and its 7000 rooms and numerous conference theatres; so we’ll take a look at what took place at the ninth consecutive HxGN LIVE 2019 event in Nevada to give you a flavour of what direction Hexagon is headed in and what you can expect to see in October. Where better to begin than with the opening keynote speech from Ola Rollen, the President and CEO of Hexagon.

As the opening presentation of the event, Ola instantly struck a chord with the ‘Can Data Save the World’ speech. Entering the stage to ‘The Final Countdown’ tune from Europe, Ola started by saying: “This is an extremely ambitious subject, but let’s ‘try to save the world’. The first question is does the world need saving? As the third rock from the sun, the world will do fine without us, but what is under threat is mankind. What we will focus on is how to save mankind, and not the earth.”

Ola continued by looking at statistics on the extinction of species such as the extinction of 80% of marine mammals, 50% of all plant life and 83% of all land mammals. Further startling statistics on de-forestation, micro-plastic consumption and over-population really hit home with delegates; and Ola cleverly linked the exponential global GDP growth to the industrial revolution, economic development and our goals for growth and a better lifestyle. “We have scaled up, but not sustainably and this is our problem. Scientists predict the point of no sustainable return is 2050, so we have 30 years to fix this, and it could be the best business opportunity you have ever encountered. We have to transform ‘bad into good’ and monetise the opportunities.”

Ola provided video testimonials and statistics and alluded to how F1 cars are 30% more efficient than road vehicles, highlighting how metrology data from Hexagon has been used in F1, solely to improve efficiency. “We have the technology and the data available, we need to scale it better and F1 is proof that we can do it. By transferring this data to road vehicles we could save 3billion metric tonnes of CO2 a year from the global annual consumption rate of 36 billion tonnes. We can transfer this data to the aerospace and agriculture industries also, to create greater environmental savings.”

For those less familiar with the breadth and scope of the Hexagon brand, the company extends way beyond metrology and CAD/CAM software. The Las Vegas event hosted more than 150 seminars and presentations that ran concurrently on the first day of proceedings with an equal number of educational opportunities on each of the three full days of the event. Yes, that’s well over 400 presentations. The subject matter and scope of Hexagon is mind-blowing with products, solutions and innovations as far reaching as building construction and design, geospatial and data mapping, mobile MapWorks and GPS, utilities detection, mapping and operational software; digital twins, visualisation and automation platforms, geo-scientific imagery, public safety and much much more.

The company has products and solutions that can, and are being integrated into almost all aspects of our daily life without our realisation. The hundreds of presentations covered examples from industries and applications as diverse as air traffic control, smart cities, the monitoring of natural disasters and debris flow, utilities management and efficiency, policing and safer communities, mining, public transport, space travel and environmental management. Of course, the underlying theme was the promotion of Hexagon products and solutions that was ingeniously packaged as an environmentally, cost and time efficient spectrum of innovation that rightly appealed to everyone. This message was underlined throughout the event with real-life examples aplenty.

All this tied neatly back to the introductory keynote speech from OIa Rollen. Beyond the manufacturing sector, Ola gave note to how the Georeferencing of seed plantation, pesticides, fertilisation and watering in the agriculture industry can reduce agriculture CO2 levels by 50% whilst increasing food output by 30% and thereby shaving an additional 4billion tonnes of CO2 from global output - just by using data we can already access. In the manufacturing industry, Ola stated the global industry has 40% efficiency and by using scientific data we could reach 95% efficiency, shaving an additional 5billion tonnes of CO2 from world consumption. “Business, as usual, is not the best business decision going forward. You may say what has this got to do with me? But never before in your career has the cost of doing nothing been so high, and it keeps on rising. If you don’t react to opportunities, you will be run out of business. You will lose market share and costs will sky-rocket. For businesses that look for scalable sustainability by using data in their processes to reduce CO2 and global footprint, those businesses will be the winners.”

“Our vision at Hexagon is where data is fully leveraged, so we can really take advantage of it for humanity and create a sustainable situation for us all as a species. I think you should all use the opportunity to ask Hexagon experts to explain opportunities. We are what we have been waiting for! We have to fix this global problem and we don’t have time to wait for somebody else to fix this for us. So, it is your data that can save the world – but only if we put it to work,” concluded Rollen.

Following the engaging opening address, the event kicked off with the ‘Manufacturing Intelligence Track’ that got underway with a packed training programme from the manufacturing software portfolio. CAE solutions training ran in parallel with the PC-DMIS Users’ Group masterclasses, while users of the SURFCAM, EDGECAM and CABINET VISION production software solutions also engaged in dedicated sessions throughout the week.

Attendees also had the opportunity to visit ‘The Zone’ for their first look at the technology showcase where manufacturers were invited to see Hexagon’s vision of the smarter manufacturing ecosystem through an augmented reality experience before getting hands-on with the design and engineering, production and metrology solutions. This gave attendees the platform to discuss ways to make factories, processes and products smarter with application experts.

One of the centrepiece presentations was delivered by Norbert Hanke who took to the stage for his track keynote ‘Smart Is Hiding in Plain Sight’, inviting the audience to join him on a search for ‘smart’. This presentation that will be delivered at the Belfry in October, focused around finding data in factories and learning how to put it to work – enforcing the thread that was delivered by Ola Rollen during his opening speech.

The event also welcomed dozens of guest speakers that all delivered a broad scope of insights and perspectives from the global manufacturing industry. One such presentation was provided by Mr Doug Woods, the President of The Association For Manufacturing Technology. He shared insights from his work with manufacturers around the world; reflecting on the state of the industry, its readiness and willingness to pursue a smart manufacturing strategy and some of the new enabling technologies helping to make it happen.

Continuing this ‘enabling technology’ theme, Erik Josefsson, Vice President, Head of Advanced Industries at Ericsson, explained the six superpowers of 5G and what it will mean for factory connectivity. As well as presentations, seminars and the latest technological advancements the HxGN LIVE event also hosted the third annual ‘Manufacturing Leadership Summit’. The goal of the summit was to offer a think-tank style experience for industry leaders to tackle some of the big issues in manufacturing and for customers to learn from each other.

At the forthcoming Belfry event, acclaimed futurist, author and global speaker Stefan Hyttfors will deliver a seminar on ‘Five things you must know about the future.’ Focussing on disruptive technologies, behavioural change and next-generation leadership with a background in journalism and economics, his mission is to make manufacturers ready for change. “Change is what makes life fun, what makes each generation more well off than the one before and what makes this a great time to be alive. It’s a relentless tide that we can either fight against or ride. I prefer riding it, and I want to help you do the same.” Be sure to book your place at the Smart Manufacturing UK event and attend with a mindset to embrace change and succeed.