Design and Production Engineering&Mechatronics, Automation and Smart Materials

Biography

Biography: Andrew A Goldenberg

Abstract

Mechatronics is an essential multidisciplinary element of modern engineering design that is required in the development of products and processes that are multi-user oriented, simple to maintain, programmable, and, most recently, fully automatic or autonomous. The foundation of mechatronics is the concurrency of mechanical, electrical and computer engineering designs and their embedded integration in any product. The essence of the design is to create products that have a market value as opposed to research that is the undertaking of developing the core technology embedded in the products. Thus, core technology, through patents, trademarks, technical secrets and know-how can be valued by the market through its perceived relevancy in creating new products. This market value is further affected by the perceived market impact and estimation of penetration of the new products. Academic and research-oriented institutions focus almost unilaterally on the development of core technology. They are guided by the perceived market needs; competitions between research institutions expressed by the publications and citations of each, and shear curiosity. The related undertakings are usually not linked directly to product development. This leads to excessive generation of core technology that may or may not be directly useful. Nonetheless, it may be ahead of the state-of-the-art, sometime by a decade, therefore, one cannot fully assess its impact. The fact is that core technologies directly related to market-driven products under development or already in use are rarely addressed outside those businesses whose main undertaking is to develop the products first place. This presentation recommends a closer collaboration of sides, research and industry, by closely adhering to mechatronics principle of simultaneous development that is embedding the research in the product development. This would provide a better justification for research funding from the participating businesses instead of almost totally relying on government support of research.