Fanuc CNC Gets New Name, New Collaborators

Less than a year after the official dissolution of the GE Fanuc joint venture, Fanuc CNC America Corp. made two announcements regarding the company and its future at the IMTS 2010 event this week in Chicago. The first announcement involved the official renaming of the company to Fanuc FA America Corp. The second announcement related to a collaborative agreement with Rockwell Automation to offer closer integration between Fanuc FA America’s CNC and Rockwell Automation’s programmable automation controller (PAC) environments. The FA in Fanuc’s new moniker refers to Factory Automation. The company is a division of Fanuc Ltd. Japan.

According to Fanuc, the company’s appearance at IMTS 2010 with its new name marks the first time in more than three decades that Fanuc FA America is presenting a single Fanuc FA entity in the Americas. Fanuc FA America claims to be the largest CNC organization in the Americas with more than 350 employees dedicated to CNC sales, service and support.

With regard to the Rockwell Automation and Fanuc FA collaboration, the companies say they will be working together on connectivity between their controller platforms through open communication technologies such as the EtherNet/IP and FL Net protocols.

Both companies cited customer demand for integrated solutions based on open platforms as a key driver of this collaborative effort.

Initial emphasis of the collaboration will be on developing, deploying and promoting integration technologies that simplify customers’ applications and improve the performance of industrial automation systems where both CNCs and PACs are used. The two companies will jointly document integration methods, quantify integration savings and work with joint customers to solve application challenges with an integrated CNC and PAC platform.