Plate specialist Nela buys image processing partner
Jan 26, 2009 at 05:01 pm by
Staff
After working with the company for a year, plate register systems specialist Nela has bought OMCS Optical Measurement’s product range and recruited some of its key people. Based in Dessau, Germany, OMCS develops optical surface inspection systems used to examine rubber, polymer and ceramic parts.
Nela president Frank Neumeister says the acquisition is a strategic move combining the latest and most powerful technologies “in an ideal way with our expertise in the field of optical inspection systems”.
Knowhow in machine building and optical inspection technology for 2D and 3D applications will pave the way for enhancement of Nela’s technology for newspaper, web commercial and sheetfed printing, and open up the group to further growth: “The automated and touch-less inspection of mass parts and composite materials offers many business opportunities as industry requirements for precise, gapless and fully automated inspection of entire batches are quite considerable,” he says.
Close cooperation over the past 12 months has seen the completion of a number of design and automation project, including optical inspection systems for rubber seals and their integration into manufacturing cells, and optical colour register systems for closed-loop control on press cylinders and webs.
Klaus Widmann, who was president of OMCS and joins Nela as director of optical inspection systems, says the companies complement one another in many ways: “I am specially impressed by the flexibility and the precision of engineering and mechanical assembly at Nela,” he says.
OMCS sites at Dessau and Wuxi (China) have been integrated Nela’s sites and “leading personnel” have been made job offers. Other details are confidential.
The Nela group of Brüder Neumeister and its US and Asian subsidiaries claims to be the largest register and plate automation company in the printing industry. Register systems include inline punch and bend systems for newspaper and commercial printing, as well as plate automation and transport systems. More than 1400 of its Vision punch/bender systems have been installed.
OMCS’s 15 years in image processing has seen it engineer a variety of inspection systems in the rubber and automotive industries, as well as in medical technology.
