Robot buying binges give way to new strategies: GM, Cytec industries share process automation success stories at ARC forum. (News at the front).

MSI, March, 2003 by Hill, Sidney, Jr.

In the 1980s, General Motors (GM) considered itself a technological leader because robots performed many of GM's assembly operations. But in the early 1990s, GM, which at the time was America's largest corporation, was on the verge of bankruptcy, and its cavalier attitude toward technology spending was a major contributing factor.

"We actually measured success by the number of robots we had in place," recalls Jim Caie, GM's director of controls, robotics, and welding. Today, with competitors from Japan, Germany, and elsewhere firmly established in what is now a global automotive market, GM is much more careful about how it spends its process automation dollars. And the Detroit-based auto giant is not alone in that regard.

Judicious investment in...

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