To cater for the growing demand for its expertise, specialist in automation solutions, Automation Systems & Controls (ASC), has brought in an expert engineer from offshore to help expand on its knowledge and services across Australia.
ASC specialises in vision inspection systems, 1D and 2D code reading solutions, electrical automation engineering services, and automation equipment sales.
Products either sold individually or supplied within ASC turnkey engineered automation solutions include vision inspection systems, robotics, programmable logic controllers, human-machine interface, motion products, identification systems, industrial sensors and controls, safety of machinery solutions, and IoT technologies.
“A large part of what we do is design, integration and implementation of turnkey solutions packages for industrial automation, along with the commissioning, servicing and training of said solutions,” Darren Lee, previous general manager of ASC, and current creative lead at Creative Concepts, tells PKN.
“We service a very broad client base across all sectors – basically, any sector where there’s a need to identify products, for example on a conveyor or as it is being manufactured where there needs to be some kind of camera work for visual identification and verification, that is where we do our work.
“The main sectors that we service are the food and beverage and pharmaceuticals industries – brands like Jalna, Peters Ice Cream, Cadbury and Coles, as well as in warehousing, such as with our largest account in Amazon.”
Currently, the Australian-owned and operated company employs a team of around 15 full-time engineers and four part-timers. The company’s head office, warehouse and training facility is located in Bayswater, Victoria.
Despite being located in Victoria, ASC services the country by sending out its team of experts interstate on a co-ordinated needs basis. Due to the rise in demand, a long-term plan was actioned and the building blocks were put in place to expand with new engineers.
Approximately two years ago, Ryan Hart, a Cognex expert from Canada, was employed with the sole focus to add service and support to the company's NSW operation. Hart now calls Sydney home and brings the full complement of ASC services to the region.
And, just this year, Rick Colling, a co-founder of ASC, has made the transition to support the Queensland region in a permanent capacity for over half of the calendar year.
“Although our engineers work remotely from a home office, they are actually stocked and have engineering support and capabilities at the ready for our clients,” Lee says.
“I think that is the way of the future really. Not a lot of sense to be opening up warehouses when we are so much more about design and integration, so it isn’t necessary for us and we can work remotely.
“Moving forward, we intend to further expand on our talents for NSW, as well as work to gain a greater presence in Western Australia, as currently it is the hardest locale for us to service strictly based on geography, so we intend to get a direct representative there at some point.”
ASC will be presenting at Megatrans 2021 in September to speak on the new innovation they are promoting, known as 3D Vision, which the company says will be “the next level of integration”.
The technology allows to do measurements and search for discrepancies in both the 2D and 3D plane. It has the ability to do comparisons between various bits of information on a carton, for example, to verify that the product is as said, and that the labelling is all correct.
The company aims to do a full site installation for the Vision 3D series at some point during the year. Watch this space for more.
