Since the 1980s, Campetella has developed an innovative series of Cartesian robots and manipulators that have achieved extraordinary market success, particularly in the plastic moulding sector, thanks to their high performance and reliability.

The impetus for ICON to explore automation arose when the company was faced with a specific project that required operators to repeatedly retrieve 300°F hot plastic parts and place them in a cooling bath. According to Kleitsch-Killam, the project required that operators stand on their feet for the entire workday to complete the task. “This repetitive manual process led to concerns about both worker safety and operational inefficiencies,” she says.

NSK linear guides and rolling bearings find use in many advanced automation systems for plastic injection moulding processes, including the industrial robots manufactured by Campetella Robotic Center.

CEO Elia Campetella said: "Our customers ask us to help them build high-productivity lines, where every element of the automation chain offers maximum optimisation, not just to guarantee high speed, but to ensure that it never breaks down or stops unexpectedly. This means that the starting point for our designers is the highest quality components and sub-systems, without which we, in turn, could not guarantee the highest quality and lowest total cost of ownership for our customers. For this reason, we ask our strategic suppliers, which include NSK, to adopt the same philosophy: quality and reliability must always be market- leading. This is the only way we can enhance the creativity of our designers who devise the many automation solutions for workpiece handling that we offer.”

Kleitsch-Killam adds, “We can also monitor our system via a handy app, but Formic is committed to identifying and fixing problems before they even arise.”

For many years, designers at Campetella Robotic Center have been using NSK's solutions for the realisation of Cartesian robots and many other handling systems. In particular, the company uses the latest generation of linear guides and roller bearings, chosen for their performance characteristics and absolute reliability.

With a command center for remote login, Formic monitors its systems 24/7 to moderate temperatures, look for anomalies and find opportunities to improve usage and performance, according to Ilkhechi. “In addition, when a customer’s needs change, we can reprogram systems to accommodate new projects. And for customers with Formic Flex, we can even swap out their entire system—all at no cost to them,” he notes.

ICON and Formic collaborated to design and deploy a custom automated solution. Taking a technology-agnostic approach, Formic sourced hardware and software components from a range of suppliers, taking performance and suitability for ICON’s needs into consideration. The RaaS offering also adapts as needs evolve.

The experience gained in the industrial automation world has made the company’s robots a landmark in Industry 4.0 applications relating to plastic materials. This leading position is also thanks to consolidated partnerships with the world’s principal manufacturers of injection moulding machines. For each application in the plastics sector, Campetella studies and proposes the most suitable technological solution for handling and moving parts. From labelling to assembly, from quality control to palletising, the company’s design team is able to provide and implement the most suitable automatic systems that guarantee series production 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The workplace is not only safer, but employee satisfaction is up and there is a reduction in employee turnover. Kleitsch-Killam says ICON’s corporate management team tries to frame the use of automation as a “productivity enhancer” rather than a “person replacer,” but there was initial skepticism from some of their long-time employees. “Once they saw that nobody was getting laid off to ‘make room’ for this automation, however, they recognized how much easier and safer it made their job. Those working on the less-staffed overnight and weekend shifts, in particular, now see much more opportunity to take on skilled roles within the company than before.

Another feature highly appreciated by Campetella Robotic Center is the unique Gothic arch profile of NSK’s NH/NS guides, which guarantees perfect straightness in long junction rails. The Gothic arch profile with four-point ‘X’ contact guarantees rigidity without losing the ability to compensate for small alignment errors. In addition, the four deep-groove rails are equipped with oversized balls to ensure maximum load capacity.

Kleitsch-Killam says ICON initially reached out to a familiar conventional vendor, but the capital expenditure (CapEx) was too high and only covered the robotic unit—not any of the essential auxiliary equipment.

She says the onsite staff training was an informative six-hour-long, hands-on course. “The cell includes a customized robotic machine operator (a 6-axis articulated FANUC robot arm), which was installed on our largest injection molding press, a 720-ton Nissei FV9100 that is over 20 years old,” she says. “It also includes a vertical conveyor that fully automates the process of loading, unloading and lowering the finished parts into the cooling bath for the final annealing process. This project consists of eight different parts, and programs for each size are set by Formic and maintained with software from Rockwell Automation.”

Founded in 2001, family-owned, Phoenix-based ICON Injection Molding caters to a range of industries, making parts for laboratory use, security devices, pool equipment and more. “With a dedication to ‘Excellence from Art to Part,’ we have grown organically to become a go-to provider of custom plastic injection molding,” says Nicole Kleitsch-Killam, chief administrative officer at ICON. “It also means that if a customer wants to order only 1,000 parts this month and 100,000 next month, we have to be able to react.”

“While our operators faced persistent minor injuries such as burns, as well as a high risk of more serious injuries, our overnight and weekend shifts were marred by inconsistent staffing levels that led to disruptions.” She says as they grappled with the resulting high worker turnover, inconsistent output, longer lead times and higher prices for end customers, “We knew automation was the answer to both challenges.”

Under Formic’s pay-for-productivity RaaS model, ICON pays for the operation of the robots when they are actively deployed. This hourly payment structure avoids a large CapEx spend and still reaps automation benefits.

“This collaboration with Formic has been a case study of sorts for us, reflecting the potential of RaaS and its impact on ICON's future,” she continues. “Right now, we’re focused on expansion to a new building on our premises, which ultimately means we’ve got room to amplify the role of robotics in what we do…We look forward to collaborating with Formic to determine what project or task to automate next.”

Since implementing RaaS, ICON has experienced significant improvements across various performance indicators, including a 20% increase in production, a 40% reduction in operational expenses and a 30% improvement in cycle-time efficiency, according to Kleitsch-Killam.

“Automation seemed out of reach, financially, until our CEO asked Jeff Galindo, our executive operations specialist, to find a solution,” she explained. “An industry friend introduced him to Formic, and he was blown away. With no upfront CapEx and a low $10/hour rate, Formic’s ‘Robotics-as-a-Service’ model just seemed too good to be true. We were even more impressed to learn that Formic would manage the maintenance, upkeep and programming of the system.”

Campetella Robotic Center is an Italian company specialising in the production and application of industrial robots and automation systems for plastic injection moulding. Its history goes back centuries – the business was founded back in 1897 as a manufacturer of special agricultural equipment and, over the years, has accompanied hundreds of entrepreneurs along the path where craftsmanship turns into industry. While maintaining strong roots in the Marche region, five successive generations of the Campetella family have been able to take full advantage of the opportunities offered by globalisation, today serving multinational customers on all continents.

Luca Marinangeli, Purchasing Manager of Campetella Robotic Center, said: "Thanks to years of successful collaboration and mutual trust, our designers have become autonomous in the selection of components, but they often converse with NSK technicians to investigate new solutions or identify new opportunities offered by the latest technological solutions. A good example is the K1 self-lubrication system, which has been tried and tested since its introduction to the market and has become standard in all Campetella-manufactured machines wherever major linear movements are required. The K1 system allows us to guarantee maintenance-free solutions for our customers, which is a great and appreciated added value in plants that must work 24/7, year-round. It’s not uncommon for our machines to use roller bearings that must work for millions of cycles at high speeds and with very heavy loads. Since using NSK's K1 self-lubrication unit, the roller bearing block and linear guide have an operating life that exceeds that of other machine components, such as electrical cables, and never requires maintenance."

Presently, Campetella Robotic Center is a leading company focused on mechanical designs and concepts, while also providing software engineering, plant installation, and industrial robot sales and aftersales assistance. Robotic solutions for the plastic moulding sector still represent core business. This solid experience has led to the company’s selection by major national and international industrial groups with multiple production needs: from unloading the part from the extruder to final packaging of the product ready for shipment to the consumer.

These are just a few of the many examples that show how the fruitful collaboration between two sector leaders contributes to their mutual success, fostering the development of a company that, in over 120 years of history, has never stopped facing new challenges for the benefit of its customers.

In the spirit of close co-operation between the companies, NSK has begun collaborating with the Campetella Academy by presenting its most advanced linear motion solutions to help develop next-generation products and solutions.

As Machine Design’s technical editor, Sharon Spielman produces content for the brand’s focus audience—design and multidisciplinary engineers. Her beat includes 3D printing/CAD; mechanical and motion systems, with an emphasis on pneumatics and linear motion; automation; robotics; and CNC machining.

Misa Ilkhechi, co-founder and vice president of product and partnerships at Formic, says, “Formic owns, programs, installs and maintains robotic systems from vendors like FANUC, Universal Robots and Yaskawa Motoman at its own cost, assuming the financial risk for customers…Put simply, if any of our systems don’t work or fail to hit the agreed-upon productivity metrics, we don’t get paid, so we’re literally invested in keeping them running well.”

The issue of skills is very important to Campetella Robotic Center, so much so that it recently launched the strategic Campetella Academy project.

Spielman has more than three decades of experience as a writer and editor for a range of B2B brands, including those that cover machine design; electrical design and manufacturing; interconnection technology; food and beverage manufacturing; process heating and cooling; finishing; and package converting.

As Formic grows, it is creating a library of automation solutions that can do everyday tasks, Ilkhechi explains, “so that even as we customize solutions, we don’t have to continuously reinvent the wheel.” At the same time, Formic is creating a platform where the company purchases hardware in bulk, which solves supply chain issues and reduces the cost and access to hardware for its customers and for other sub-component and system integrators that sit between Formic and the hardware, he says. “As Formic builds its knowledge and hardware base, it will be able to lower subscription costs and continue to democratize automation for U.S. manufacturers.”

"The market is asking for increasingly advanced and complex solutions,” Campetella added. “For a company like ours, it’s essential to keep pace with the latest technologies. At the same time, it’s vital that we transfer the knowledge we’ve accumulated to our customers, to help them achieve their business objectives. The Campetella Academy provides a meeting point for us, our strategic suppliers and our customers. It promotes the dissemination of automation knowledge in the production environment, to the benefit of all, so that everyone can strengthen their role in an increasingly competitive and challenging global market."