Schneider Electric is a global leading company in the automation and electrical distribution business. Main development sites of Schneider Electric Industrial Automation are in France, Germany and USA. It combines the Telemecanique, SquareD, Modicon and former AEG master brands of the parent company Schneider Electric Industries. The Schneider Electric Industrial Automation brands offer its target industrial process end users and OEM customers superior products and services throughout their automation journey. Currently Schneider Electric Industries is employing 64 000 people world wide with revenues of about 6 billion Euro. Industrial Automation as part of Schneider Electric Industries is employing around 2000 People. Key customers like DaimlerChrysler, Coca Cola, VW, Mars, Opel, Merck, General Motors, Ford, BASF, Thyssen, Burton using the competencies and project experiences in the automation and electrical distribution business of Schneider Electric Industrial Automation. Innovative technologies like PC based control systems are developed and driven by Schneider Electric Industrial Automation as well as contributions to international standards for automation like IEC 61131 and IEC 61499. Further Schneider Electric Industrial Automation is leading in the combination of IT and industrial automation, in the usage of internet based protocols and in development of agent-oriented software for flexible control systems.

The Fraunhofer Gesellschaft is the leading contract organisation for applied research in Germany. Currently the portfolio of competencies comprises more than 50 institutes mainly in Germany but also in the US and Asia. With 11000 employees the total annual budget reaches 710 mio €. Approximately 40 % of the turnover is based on direct contract research for industrial customers.

The IPA with more than 200 employees is the largest Fraunhofer Institute located in Stuttgart, Germany. The institute offers contract research and industrial developments in three activity fields:

• Corporate Management
• Automation
• Manufacturing Technologies

In these business areas the IPA achieves an annual turnover of more than 30 mio € in which approximately 50 % are in contract research for industry.

In this project proposal the department Robot Systems of the Automation division in IPA participates. Within this division 68 employees develop innovative automation systems for a variety of applications:

• Manufacturing
• Trade
• Services
• Health-care
• Construction equipment
• Transport and Traffic
• Entertainment

The School of Mechanical and Systems Engineering at Newcastle University are a multidisciplinary school offering a wide range of excellent undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, covering topics from many facets of mechanical engineering. Research within the school is far ranging and encompasses the fields of robotics, bioengineering, engineering mathmatics, MEMS, smart materials, manufacturing plus power and transmission systems.

The newly formed Stephenson Centre actively promotes collaboration between academia and industry at a local, national and international level, specialist units within the centre include:
The Design Unit provides design, development and consultancy services to industrial engineering customers in the fields of gear technology and metrology, testing and failure analysis, medical instrumentation, and special machine tools.
EDC - Engineering Design Centre to improve engineering design for the cost effective and efficient design, manufacture, and operation of made-to-order products.
RCID - Regional Centre for Innovation in Engineering Design for the creation of a collaborative research and development environment in which Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) can develop methods and processes to enhance product development and improve their business performance.
ISRU - Industrial Statistics Research Unit has a wealth of experience with industry especially SME's. ISRU's work is related to process improvement and production quality issues, dealing with uncertainty, safety and reliability. ISRU is one of the leading exponents of the use of Experimental Design for production purposes.