Originally posted by Joe Cogliano of the Dayton Business Journal at http://www.bizjournals.com/dayton/news/2015/05/27/university-of-dayton-research-institute-tapped-by.html.
A local manufacturer is hiring the University of Dayton Research Institute to grow its business.
Miamisburg-based Advanced Industrial Measurement Systems just signed a more than $250,000 contract with UDRI to develop high-tech solutions for coordinate measurement machines. Also known as CMMs, the machines are used for measurement and inspection by the manufacturing industry.
UDRI was tapped to develop software drivers so Advanced Industrial Measurement can retrofit older machines with new probes and software, while customers can keep their existing programs. Without the drivers, inspection and measurement software programs would all need to be re-written in a new probe’s language.
The deal was signed in the last week and work should take about nine months.
Bringing new software tools to market will provide a big advantage to Advanced Industrial Measurement, which will likely lead to new customers and more work for existing clients.
The UDRI contract is just one of several new investments the company is making to grow. On Tuesday, we told you it was spending $1 million to launch its own line of machines with plans to double revenue in three years. Click here to read that story.
Designing software to make systems work together — known as interoperability — isn’t a new concept, but observers don’t see a lot of this happening yet in the CMM industry.
Kevin Klawon, group leader for software systems in UDRI’s Sensor Systems division, said even if the industry adopts a new unified standard, the drivers developed for Advanced Industrial Measurement will provide a solution until all existing equipment is replaced. Those changes could take decades.
UDRI is familiar with the concept, having created one of the first “plug-and-play software architectures” for unattended ground sensors for the U.S. Air Force.
Making the connection
To get its problem solved, Advanced Industrial Measurement went to Fastlane. Part of UDRI, Fastlane is an Ohio Manufacturing Extension Partnership that exists to help manufacturers improve competitiveness.
Fastlane connected the company with the most relevant experts at UDRI. Officials say the result will be a high-quality product that’s cost effective. It also will give students exposure to real-world software engineering work.
“It’s good for the company, it’s good for the community,” Klawon said.
Advanced Industrial Measurement, which has 17 local employees and two people at a Michigan sales office, is in the process of hiring two service engineers. Dave Delph, president and co-owner, told me his company is on track to post $5 million in revenue this year, up from $3.5 million in 2014. He anticipates sales of $10 million in three years.
