Altus takes part in an international initiative to promote technological development

Here at Altus, we are technology enthusiasts and completely fascinated by the possibilities it brings to industry and society. For this reason, we seek to establish relationships of mutual collaboration with different institutions which, like us, also value innovation and are agents of technological development. We recently engaged in another initiative with this goal, an international project that aims to boost the process of collaborative development in different sectors of the world’s economy.

To start talking about it, we need to go back to October 2019. At the time, our president Ricardo Felizzola was in Biel, Switzerland, participating in the 2nd International Smart Factory Summit, an event created to discuss strategies for implementing smart factories across the world. The occasion led to the first handshake with Dominic Gorecky, Head of Swiss Smart Factory, an institution that promotes research and development applied to the Swiss technology sector and is part of Switzeralnd Innovation Park Biel/Bienne (SIPBB)

At this event, on this very day, the foundation stone for the start of the project was laid. Why? Today, Altus and Swiss Smart Factory are two of the bodies involved in the Swiss-Brazilian initiative to promote innovation.

President Ricardo Felizzola`s visit to the Swiss Smart Factory

About the Swiss-Brazilian collaboration

According to Altus’ President Felizzola, one of the objectives of Altus` internationalization process is "to keep in touch with entities from countries that are leaders in innovation". In addition to being one of the countries that most invest in research and development, about 3% of GDP, Switzerland also has a high rate of spending on education, reaching 5.6% of GDP. Generous investments like these create an efficient education, research and innovation ecosystem, which leads the country to figure as the leader in the world ranking of innovation.

This structured research process, together with the creativity and intellectual capital of Brazilian professionals, creates the perfect environment for innovation incentive ventures.

The initiative came out of a public notice launched in 2020 by Innosuisse, an innovation agency linked to the Swiss government, in partnership with Embrapii, a Brazilian Company for Industrial Research and Innovation linked to the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. In it, technological development partnerships were proposed between ICTs (Institutes of Science and Technology) and Brazilian companies, together with ICTs and Swiss companies. As they already had a solid relationship during the 2019 Summit, Altus and Swiss Smart Factory got together to submit a project, and were selected!

The technology behind the project

The presented project foresees the creation of an automation equipment that can be used for data analysis and prediction of scenarios in most industrial environments.

“The product is a well-designed project that involves artificial intelligence, prediction of failures in rotating machines, remote operation in start-up protocols and testing of smart products”, explains Felizzola.

On the Swiss side, in addition to the Swiss Smart Factory, which will act as ICT, the companies Cencerus and MyLiveZone will also participate in the project. On the Brazilian side, the Senai Institute of Innovation and Technology, will be the ICT partner of Altus in the development of the device.

For this joint execution to be possible, a remote development methodology will be used in all stages of the innovation process. The resource, created by MyLiveZone, allows engineers and designers in different locations to access the same equipment and develop solutions in a collaborative and totally remote way.

This effort, unprecedented in the industrial automation scenario, is yet another example of the full strength of Altus brand and the great innovation capacity of the organization`s team of employees! "The initiative will help Altus to fulfill its fundamental objective when starting internationalization, which is to be at the edge of world innovation", highlights Felizzola.

By engaging in this project, shared with Swiss entities with a high innovative index, the company consolidates its position as one of the world`s leading suppliers of technology to the industry.

Participating entities

Innosuisse

Innosuisse is the Swiss innovation promotion agency. The group`s mission is to promote science-based innovation for application in improvements of interest to industry and society and, thus, strengthens the competitiveness of small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) in the country.

Embrapii

The Brazilian Industrial Research and Innovation Company works through cooperation with scientific and technological research institutions, public or private, focusing on business demands and targeting risk sharing in the pre-competitive phase of innovation. Its objective is to stimulate the industrial sector to innovate more and with greater technological intensity, thus enhancing the competitive strength of companies both in the domestic and international markets.

Swiss Smart Factory of Switzerland Innovation Park Biel/Bienne

Swiss Smart Factory is the first neutral test and demonstration platform for Industry 4.0 in Switzerland. Its vision is to become an internationally recognized center for its competence in researching solutions for Industry 4.0. The objective of the initiative is to create an ecosystem of partners through which innovations and new technologies for Industry 4.0 can be developed.

SENAI

A longtime partner of Altus, SENAI Institute of Innovation in Integrated Solutions in Metal Mechanics (ISI SIM) is a unit accredited by EMBRAPII that operates mainly in innovation and applied research projects to increase the productivity and competitiveness of the Brazilian industry.

MyLiveZone

A pioneer in the area of industrial remote access in Switzerland, MyLiveZone works in the development of open technological platforms with plug-and-play resources for scanning and remote control of industrial equipment. The organization leads the worldwide remote training scenario for industrial equipment operation.

Cencerus

The company operates in the E2E software development market for Industry 4.0, providing innovative solutions for IoT applications.  cencerus will perform the cloud integration of the Altus controller with a standard IoT solution and develop the logics in the edge area and in the IoT cloud for data collection, data processing, data storage and data forwarding. In addition, cencerus will support the development of the predictive maintenance infrastructure.