Top Benefits of Financing your Industrial Automation Upgrade

Industrial Automation is the future and incorporating it into your manufacturing workflow is an absolute necessity in today’s business climate. While the evolution of robots and specifically calibrated machinery has changed our production processes and methodologies for the better, it comes at a significant monetary cost.

The most difficult part of adopting and benefiting from industrial automation is getting hold of the machinery itself. There are a myriad of financing options available for you to choose from and an even wider range of vendors offering their services. Trying to make the best decision for your company and your finances can become difficult for this very reason.

You can go to a bank and ask them to finance your upgrades, but your credit score and history will play a huge role in this acquisition. Smaller businesses in particular might find banks reluctant to invest in this steep upfront cost for them, which is where private financing companies like Dimension Funding come in.

Most of the time, in situations like this, financing your industrial automation upgrades will be your best bet – regardless of the size of your business or the equipment you’re looking to have installed. 

Here are 4 reasons why. 

1. Only Purchased Industrial Automation Equipment Is Used as Collateral

A problem with financing through bank loans is that the bank lending the money will require a “blanket UCC lien.” This allows the bank to take all the assets of your company as a security for the financed equipment. It grants them the legal right to seize these assets in the event of nonpayment. Banks do this as an extra peace of mind to ensure you pay up, but it lessens your position and is undeniably a big liability.

Private financing companies on the other hand do not require a “blanket lien.” In fact, many only require the equipment being financed to be used as a security instead of everything you own. This keeps you in control and minimizes huge losses in case of non-payment.

2. All Industrial Automation Upgrade Expenses Are Taken into Account

Another problem with financing your industrial automation upgrade through banks is the fact that they don’t cover soft costs like installing the equipment, transporting the equipment, and maintaining it in the long run. These are all expenses that you are expected to pay on your own and can come as an unpleasant surprise after already agreeing to pay a large sum of money for the equipment itself.

If you finance your upgrades privately, however, all these expenses are accounted for and included in your principal amount. This minimizes any sudden or unexpected costs and gives you the full picture of what you’re actually paying for. Better awareness of what you pay allows you to plan better and allocate those funds for more important things in your business.

3. Fixed Monthly Payments

Private financing companies like Dimension Funding offer yet another advantage when compared to conventional bank loans. Banks usually prefer to loan money on a floating or a variable rate of interest which results in irregular monthly payments. Besides the inconvenience of having to constantly stay updated with these payments, it makes it more difficult to plan and allocate financial resources efficiently.

Privately financing your company’s industrial automation through a third-party company means that you will pay a fixed monthly payment for the entire duration of the automation equipment’s decided term. There are no unpleasant changes in interest rates and no hindrances in planning for where to invest more resources in the future. This allows you to treat your payments like a consistent monthly cost. One that is easy to account and plan for.

4. Easy Application and Approval Process

The process of applying for and getting approved for private financing is more streamlined than it has ever been.

You can apply for up to $250k without providing financial statements (some restrictions apply) and if you require a larger package, a hassle-free paperwork process makes that easy too. The application is online and after you apply, the approval process can take as little as a few short hours. It’s that easy! Compare this with the mountain of paperwork required for bank loans and the associated uncertainty and lack of transparency. Private financing is a clear winner.

Next Steps

Financial decisions like deciding to incorporate industrial automation into your production flow have the potential of either taking your business to the next level or crippling your work and efforts. Making the most beneficial choice of how and where to receive this financing is a multi-faceted problem that requires you to look at your individual needs, your budgets, and what you value as a company.

If you’re interested in learning more about financing your company’s equipment through a third-party vendor for all the reasons we’ve outlined and more, be sure to contact Dimension Funding to get a head start on your approval process.

Original Post from Dimension Funding 

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The Future of Industrial Automation How Industrial Automation Is Carrying Us into The Future 4 Ways Industrial Automation Is Changing the World

Industrial Automation is single-handedly changing the way we produce and with new advancements taking place every year, this innovation shows no signs of stopping any time soon. This disruptive pace of progress is unleashing new possibilities and redefining traditional business practices. 

 

The future is certainly bright and knowing what’s coming can help us plan better and update our manufacturing workflows for the newer, faster, better machines being produced. 

 

Here are four incredible advancements happening in industrial automation right now and becoming an early adopter of these new frameworks may be the difference between you becoming a market leader or a follower. 

1.  More Capable Machines

 

Humans can never match the dexterity and ability of robots. Whether it’s lifting extremely heavy loads or intricately placing components on a motherboard, machines usually outperform humans, and the future will only make this advantage bigger.

 

Advanced sensors, improved mechanics, and new spatial recognition software will enable robots to carry out current manufacturing processes to a greater degree of speed, accuracy, and quality. These new sensors and optics will also help pioneer new, innovative production methods as the gap between what is possible and what isn’t gets shorter and shorter.

 
2.  Artificial Intelligence

 

This ties into the previous point of machines getting smarter and more capable as the years go by. Artificial intelligence refers to the ability of machines or robots to perform tasks associated with intelligent beings. The most common examples of this are decision making scenarios and predicting what to do next. 

 

There is a huge amount of development happening in the artificial intelligence space already in mobile phones, operating systems, and self-driving cars and industrial automation is the only logical next evolution of this phase. Having robots capable of making intelligent, accurate decisions may not just be a pipedream in the future.

 

On paper at least, machines would make better decision-makers than humans as they can assess millions of gigabytes of data in a second and can give a more informed view on a particular situation. This is especially important for safety metrics like radiation or predicting potentially lethal locations.

 

Advanced AI would also enable robots to learn on the go and constantly update their processes and software depending on the task at hand. A fully automated factory with little or no workers would be the result of this. Regardless of your opinions on AI and whether machines should control everything we do in our lives, the future is still exciting, and the possibilities are quite literally endless.

 

3.  Collaborative Robots

 

Humans and robots working together to propel us into the future seems like the dream scenario and with collaborative robots (Cobots), it’s quickly turning into a reality. Cobots are designed to share workspaces with humans and make automation easy for businesses of any size. Cobots are usually controlled by humans and act as a projection or extension of a human limb.

 

Not all Cobots are created like this but their basic intent is to perform the dirty, dangerous, and dull jobs that humans either can’t do or are inefficient at. Cobots are also easy to store, recalibrate, and can be deployed for multiple applications with no hindrance to your current workflows. 

 

One of the biggest advantages of Cobots is their easy to program software and fast setup. They can be used by businesses of any size or makeup and the advancements being made in their dexterity and fluidity means that Cobots could become an indispensable part of manufacturing processes all over the world.

4.  Cheaper Machines

 

A slightly less exciting but incredibly impactful stage of the future of industrial automation is the fact that robots and manufacturing machines will become more affordable. As humans produce and evolve something for a long time, we become better at producing it at a higher volume, higher quality, and a lower price. We can find examples of this everywhere in our lives. Our appliances, our mobile phones, and televisions have all gotten cheaper and more accessible especially for people in less developed countries.

 

Let’s take India as an example. Usage of industrial robotics has increased tenfold in the country, for one simple reason: The technology has gotten much cheaper. With more and businesses using it, the companies making the robots can continue to innovate and change their design and functionality as they now have a larger customer base to take feedback from.

 

The apex of any technology only arrives when it’s used extensively by a large number of people. Only operating in niche factories would hinder the robotics industry as their hyper-specific clientele would never be able to give them the critique and feedback a more general customer base would be able to.

 

As demand for a product grows, more and more producers enter the market to meet this demand. Competition creates cheaper prices, better products, and more innovation. 

 

There are many more obscure developments happening all the time in the engineering and technology field, but the above examples highlight industrial automation improvements happening across the board and at a very rapid pace.

 

The future is certainly bright for industrial automation as the line between the world of today and the world of the future becomes more and more faded.

 

If industrial automation technology companies have customers that are interested in joining the revolution and need financing for their next automation equipment upgrade through a third-party vendor, contact Dimension Funding. Their customers are only an online application and a quick approval process away from getting a time-tested, hassle-free, and convenient financing option for their next automation upgrade. 

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A Human Touch: How Industrial Automation Is Saving Lives During COVID 19

The coronavirus pandemic threw the world into a frenzy of trying to keep our lives intact while battling an increasingly difficult and seemingly invincible foe. Looking back at 2020 now that the year is drawing to a close, we can clearly see the impact this disease has had on the world and what we humans have had to change in our lives to limit its effects.

The past nine months have forced businesses to adapt and try to keep afloat amidst restrictions, lockdowns, and social distancing guidelines. 

 

The nature of this unique and unprecedented situation has allowed certain niche operations and procedures to come to the spotlight. Industrial automation was a strong force that was sweeping the business world for years, but COVID-19 has quite literally accelerated the potential of automation by at least a decade.

 

To understand the future of automation, we have to understand this year and how robots and machines kept the world going and how they became the lifeblood of many companies and manufacturing processes. 

 

The New Normal

 

Robots have always been looked at with suspicion and even a little fear. While people are wary of the impact robots have on their job security and what their career will look like 10 years down the line, recent events have made their characteristics incredibly useful.

 

To limit transmission of the COVID-19 virus, medical professionals and the WHO have issued several guidelines on best practices to follow for businesses and individuals. This includes social distancing and limiting contact with humans as much as possible.

 

While this is a simple thing to implement for individuals, companies, and manufacturing processes that rely on many workers and laborers on a daily basis, are faced with a more complicated problem. Worker safety should, hopefully, be a top priority for them but at the same time, they can’t keep their production processes at the level they may have been before.

 

Industrial automation offers a perfect solution to this problem. COVID vulnerable workers can be replaced with machines and robots that can replicate their jobs at an acceptable if not improved level. 

 

The Potential Risk

 

The reason for this push is because the implications are quite severe. The main problem at the moment with COVID 19 is trying to reduce transmission of the disease. This is not an easy task as it is very infectious and can stay on surfaces anywhere from several hours to several days. 

 

If an asymptomatic infected person is on the assembly line and is touching or breathing on products and near his colleagues, the chances of transmission increase significantly. Obviously, gloves and masks would be worn at all times but even then, the risk is ever-present.

 

Failure to stop the spread especially from within the company itself could result in month-long closures and huge revenue losses. A potential harm that is very difficult to justify no matter how many masks your staff is wearing as someone is bound to get careless at some point or another. 

 

A New Era of Jobs

 

The future of robots replacing humans might be coming sooner than we thought. Analyst company Forrester published a report at the start of this year that notes that companies are projected to invest more in automation upgrades than in rehiring new workers after job layoffs due to the pandemic. 

 

Forrester also urged companies to accelerate their long-term automation plans as it is, according to them, the key to surviving the coronavirus recession. 

 

Does this mean that all jobs are in jeopardy? No. Most upper management positions and engineering roles will stay relevant as someone has to oversee these upgrades and machine maintenance procedures, but the future for assembly, manufacturing, and physical labor jobs is not bright.

 

This is a great opportunity for governments and other institutions to try and reskill people to get higher paying, more stable jobs in the rapidly evolving and adapting world we live in today. 

 

Industries Embracing the Change

 

The manufacturing, service, and food industries are the quickest adopters of this revolution because their work is very heavily influenced by direct human interaction whether through taking fast food orders, preparing meals, or manually putting together products. 

 

Self-service fast-food stations at McDonald’s are becoming more popular and cashier-less grocery stores are also increasing in numbers throughout the US and the rest of the developed world. The fast-food giant is also testing robot cooks and servers. 

 

Other companies like Walmart are using robots to scrub their floors in place of a human janitor. Robots in South Korea and Japan are calibrated to measure temperatures and distribute hand sanitizers. There are even UVD robots that use ultraviolet light to disinfect items. These specific robots are in extremely high demand for grocery stores and hospitals for obvious reasons.

 

All of the above examples illustrate how some of the world's biggest companies and retailers are actively trying to keep their workers safe and their business models intact. As time goes on, more and more innovative machines will be developed and calibrated to perform optimally and at a more attainable budget for the vast majority of small-scale corporations. 

 

Conclusion

 

Fearing technology and progression will result in little to no progress being made and the trajectory of where industrial automation is taking us is undeniable in its scale and overall benefits. 

 

At the end of the day, safety is more important than anything else and the fact the robots are helping limit human contact and as a result, are helping reduce the spread of the virus is reason enough to support their adaptation. 

 

In spite of global uncertainty, new technologies and products continue to be released, innovation continues to rise, and the world keeps moving forward. Automation is the catalyst for this and the reason we can keep working as well as we do and if the present is any indication for what’s to come then the future, with or without COVID 19, is certainly a bright one. 

If you’re interested in financing your next automation equipment upgrade through a third-party vendor, be sure to contact Dimension Funding. You’re only an online application and a quick approval process away from getting a time-tested, hassle-free, and convenient financing option for your next automation upgrade.