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This time of year, many of us are thinking about decorating for the holidays. Decorations lift our spirits and put us in the holiday mood. This holiday season, don't forget to decorate your name as well, with a professional certification. By adding a dash of "PMP" or a sprinkle of "CAPM" to the…
(NSF: Ann Arbor, MI) -- NSF International, a global public health and environmental organization, has published the first American national standard for commercial and residential on-site water reuse treatment systems: NSF/ANSI 350—“Onsite residential and commercial reuse treatment systems.” The…
The teaching of lean concepts is typically tuned to continuous processes: Day in, day out, value flows continuously from suppliers until the final product reaches the customer. The concepts of lead time (the time it takes individual “flow-units” to travel through a process), Takt time (the…
(Basler: Ahrensburg, Germany) -- Basler, a vision technology company, has been spearheading the development of a new standard—USB3 Vision—for industrial cameras, software, and accessories since September 2011. Introduction of the standard is planned for 2012. Upon completion of the USB3 Vision…
It’s no secret that manufacturing processes have become more complex. Manufacturers have tried hard to infuse innovation into their products, usually as new features, technologies, or attributes. However, coming up with innovative product features is not enough to create a competitive…
(CRC Press: Boca Raton, FL) -- According to a report by the Institute of Medicine, up to 98,000 deaths per year occur in U.S. hospitals as a result of adverse events. In other words, errors in hospitals cause more annual deaths than car accidents, breast cancer, or AIDS. With the health care…
(ASD: Boulder, CO) -- ASD Inc., a global leader in high-performance analytical instrumentation and materials analysis solutions, has released the FieldSpec 4 line of portable, full-range spectroradiometers. The FieldSpec 4 line is designed for faster, more precise spectral data collection.…
(Tetra 4D: Seattle, WA) -- Tetra 4D, the exclusive provider of 3-D PDF technology for Adobe Acrobat X Pro, has released 3D PDF Converter v. 3.3, the 3-D solution authorized by Adobe to run as an Acrobat plug-in.
3D PDF Converter enables powerful 3-D interaction and collaboration features in…
(Wiley: Hoboken, NJ) -- Firms are like living organisms. They’re born, they grow, and then they struggle to survive. In fact, the whole life cycle of most firms is not very long. The average life expectancy of a firm is roughly 15 years, and only one out of 20 lives longer than 50 years. The…
(Leica: Norcross, GA) -- Leica Geosystems’ Cyclone v. 7.3.2 fully supports the ASTM E57 standard for 3-D imaging data exchange, which includes 3-D laser scanning systems. This capability facilitates direct import and export of laser scan “as-built” data and related digital imagery from…
(Metrologic Group: Meylan, France) -- Metrologic Group, which designs, manufactures, and markets 3-D inspection software and dimensional control systems, has just completed the full integration of the Renishaw PH20 Probe Head with Metrologic’s electronic systems and software, providing the…
(Harrington Institute: Los Gatos, CA) -- H. James Harrington, a past president and chairman of the board for the American Society for Quality (ASQ) and the International Academy for Quality, was presented the Shanghai Magnolia Quality Special Contribution Award for his 30 years of support to…
(DIS: Clinton Township, MI) -- Dynamic Intelligent Solutions (DIS) was awarded first place in the Great Lakes 4th Annual Automotive Innovation, which was sponsored by the Detroit chapter of the Society for Automotive Engineers (SAE) and the MIT Enterprise Forum.
The competition’s objective…
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. Unlike other holidays, there is no pretentiousness. You can arrive at the host’s home dressed in everyday attire, unencumbered by a load of presents. That’s not to say guests can’t bring a tasty food dish or a bottle of wine for the host, or don your…
In a perfect world, we’d all be looking forward to the holiday season without anxiety. Unfortunately, for most employees, that isn’t even close to being the case. Times have been tough, and for several years, workers have been stretched thin as they try to do more with less. As an employer, you…
During the first winter storm this year in the Northeast, I found myself, along with hundreds of thousands of folks in the area, without power for the better part of a week. It was a long wait before the lights came on… and the heat.
Heck, they had to send the National Guard to my town, and…
(NIST: Gaithersberg, MD) -- U.S. Commerce Secretary John Bryson announced four organizations—three health care operations and one nonprofit business—as the recipients of the 2011 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the nation’s highest honor for performance excellence through innovation,…
(S. Chand Group: New Delhi) -- Implementing Six Sigma in Education Towards TQM in Academics, by Dheeraj Mehrotra (S. Chand, 2011) is about excellence in education and an experiment to solve issues concerning the teaching-learning process. Mehrotra discusses handling problems as Six Sigma…
A short time after I moved into operations as the vice president of manufacturing, our assembly department made an early and, dare I say, imperfect attempt to realign the factory floor for ease-of-material delivery and pick up. I would not describe this as improved flow because we were still…
In the wake of recent failures in corporate governance, two new standards from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) will help organizations to disclose corporate information quickly and effectively. Increased pressure by industry regulators obliges companies to provide such…
The elimination of waste (muda) from all manufacturing and logistics activities is an obvious concept. Less obvious is the fact that waste often hides in plain view. “Unfortunately, real waste lurks in forms that do not look like waste,” says Shigeo Shingo in Modern Approaches to Manufacturing…
(ANSI: New York) -- The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) International Policy Committee (IPC) has published a white paper examining standards and conformance issues affecting the ability of U.S. industry to conduct global trade. The IPC is responsible for the development of ANSI…
(InnovMetric: Québec City, Québec) -- InnovMetric Software has announced that version 12 of its PolyWorks/Modeler reverse-engineering solution offers parametric 2-D sketching capabilities at no additional cost.
The PolyWorks v. 12 sketcher allows users to:
• Create a sketch outline by…
(SME: Los Angeles) -- WESTEC, the premiere manufacturing biennial event for the Western United States, returns to Los Angeles on March 27–29, 2012, with a new look, new content, and a renewed commitment to area industry.
The event is a think tank for leaders from diverse industries where they…
(ASTM: West Conshohocken, PA) -- ASTM International has launched a revamped online version of its flagship magazine, Standardization News (SN). The magazine’s new website offers more frequently updated ASTM news that is organized into new industry-sector gateways. These serve as web portals to…
