Productive Machines, a Sheffield, UK-based artificial intelligence (AI) startup reducing lead times, cycle times, maintenance, component waste and carbon emissions for major manufacturers, raised £2.2m in Seed funding.
UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (UKI2S) led the round with participation from NPIF – Mercia Equity Finance, which is managed by Mercia and part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund*, ACT Venture Partners and Fuel Ventures, alongside grant funding from Innovate UK.
The company intends to use the funds to deliver its AI technology as a fully-automated Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) product and expand its team of eight people to more than 20.
Founded by Dr Erdem Ozturk (CEO) and Dr Huseyin Celikag (CTO), Productive Machines is commercialising the results of a six-year The University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) research project on machining dynamics. This research covered process and machine tool interactions, including how cutting forces and resulting vibrations affect machine tool performance. The company has developed a computational model to predict and mitigate the influence of these harmful vibrations at every stage in metal and composite milling jobs. It uses a digital twin to determine the best parameters for each machine tool and production run, eliminating wasteful configuration experiments and ensuring that milling jobs are right the first time.
The technology has already been deployed at ten major manufacturers, including Renault and MASA Aerospace.
Productive Machines is developing a network of partners to take its technology to market. These include measurement technology specialist Kistler, metal cutting solutions company Seco, and various other machine tool and cutting tool manufacturers.
FinSMEs
24/04/2023