Hofmann & Stirner Zuführsysteme GmbH — currently in Münchner Technologiezentrum (MTZ) is receiving around 1 million euros to expand its digital technologies in the field of feeding technology. The investors are the High-Tech Founders Fund and a business angel. The financing round was arranged by BayStartUP Investor network.
Hofmann & Stirner develops feeding systems using digital twins, applying computer-aided design (CAD) and production plant simulation. This enables them to master the systematic and sorted feeding of large quantities of microcomponents into the manufacturing process of industrial products. Hofmann & Stirner's vision is the automated development of every feeding system using artificial intelligence. With this seed funding, the young company aims to achieve further milestones in technology development.
Continuous development of the system
Feeding systems are small industrial systems that feed small parts such as screws, etc., to larger production machines. They ensure that a product's components are available at the correct assembly point, at the optimal time, and in the correct order so that the corresponding products can be manufactured. They can be found in manufacturing processes in industries ranging from the automotive to the electronics sector. Until now, these feeding systems have been manufactured almost exclusively in manual trial-and-error processes by experienced sheet metal workers using sample components. Hofman & Stirner's technology digitizes this process. To achieve this, the company relies on a holistic approach combining the innovative ROTU machine architecture with its own coordinated software. Several software modules interact and map all relevant physical processes in the feeding system.
Each real ROTU is created from its digital image and expands the training database for the training of artificial neural networks for the fully automated development of new ROTUs. This database forms the basis for the training of artificial neural networks and facilitates the continuous development of the system. The goal is to achieve fully automated new ROTU systems for various materials.
Fit for the future
“Anyone who only uses off-the-shelf software will fail in mechanical engineering due to digitalization,”
so Daniel Hofmann, CEO and co-founder of Hofmann & Stirner Zuführsysteme GmbH. Hofmann & Stirner's solution designs the feeding system so that users can convert it to convey a completely new material in less than two minutes.
