The forefront of CNC technology

OSAI, a company specialising in numerical control since 1957, left the Allen Bradley/Rockwell Group in March 1997 and is now operating again as an independent company. OSAI had started out within the machine tool division of Olivetti, and had gradually opened its activity to the international markets. The group tied closer links with Allen Bradley/Rockwell, the American leader in industrial automation, until it became a part of the Rockwell Group and changed its name and logo into Rockwell. Now, under new shareholders, which include the financial group Intek and OSAI's internal management, the company has restored its historical name.

A new start

The newly reorganised OSAI business got started very successfully, with 1997 sales exceeding ItL 40 billion (US$ 22.3 million); around 15 per cent of its CNC sales were outside Italy. Last November, the OSAI manufacturing operation moved to a newly acquired 6,000 sq.m. plant located in Barone Canavese, near Turin, which also hosts the sales and support services for the northwestern Italian area.  Other branches are located in Milan, Padua and Bologna covering the remaining regions and serving customers and users of OSAI/Rockwell numerical control systems. Altogether the Italian organisation has 135 employees.


Above: The OSAI plant in Barone, Canavese, Italy.

The European-wide sales and support organisation, partly reacquired from Rockwell and partly rebuilt by OSAI, includes:

• A fully owned subsidiary (OSAI-UK) in the UK, its traditional second market
• Direct sales representatives and exclusive distributors in Germany, Switzerland and Sweden
• Technical and support services in France, Spain, Portugal, Austria, the Czech Republic and the Netherlands. Rockwell continues to provide service and customer support in North America and Mexico

Since 1990, OSAI has started to specifically address the market for machine tools for flat glass machining, gaining an important position in the field, with sales of 400 controls per year and an installed base of more than 3000 units.

Innovative numerical control solutions

OSAI's success comes from a combination of high-tech products and a sales and support organisation which is fully skilled in the use of the most demanding applications. This results from its long history in the market, but also from the traditional attitude of its organisation, trained not only to react quickly to customer needs, but to anticipate market requirements. OSAI's 10 Series CNC is a good practical example of such an attitude and strategy: it uses an "open platform, PC-based architecture", a generalised, common concept, adopted by all main CNC suppliers. However, this concept was totally unusual and challenging nearly ten years ago, when OSAI presented the 10 Series at the Hanover EMO exhibition in 1989.

Some of its features were already available in earlier numerical controls. OSAI's previous generation, the 8600 CNC, already allowed machine constructors to enhance CNC functionality and the user interface to match them to the specific needs of their machines by using specific 8600 software tools. These tools embed new proprietary features in the control, while fully protecting their own particular knowledge and technology.
The 10 Series represents a step forward for this concept. Using a standard PC platform, the customer can programme their specific human interface, e.g. either by using standard graphic programming tools as available under Windows. Customers may also embed their own developed DOS tasks into the CNC which can interact with the real-time software environment, to apply algorithms and functions specific to their machines and applications.
These characteristics, together with an extremely competitive price/performance ratio, have accounted for the success of its CNCs in the market of cutting, edging, bevelling, grinding, drilling and glass handling machines. OSAI now equips leading glass machinery manufacturers and the factories of prestigious glass companies such as Saint-Gobain, SIV, Pilkingron, Splinrex, Glavunion, etc.

Following the separation from Allen Bradley/Rockwell, OSAI intends to increasingly target the world of glass, and expand its leadership to other important European markets.

OSAI produces numerical controls for a wide range of machine tools, robot and general motion applications, servo and spindle motors and drives, pre-sales and after-sales technical support to customers, custom application software and machine integration services, field service and repair for machine users. Company policy includes the availability of spare parts for 10 years worldwide.

We can offer enhanced equivalent products running on the proven 10/Series hardware platform to meet the market sectors formerly covered by the 8601.