Motorcycle giant Harley-Davidson is now a stakeholder in Alta Motors, the electric motorcycle and light vehicle EV drivetrain maker based in Brisbane, California. Harley-Davidson and Alta made the investment public today, and also announced that Alta Motors will collaborate with the legendary motorbike maker on building future electric motorcycles as part of the deal.

Read the latest edition, August 10 2017, of the Machinery Market here

Read the latest edition, August 4 2017, of the Machinery Market here

 BOBST – one of the world’s leading suppliers of equipment and services to packaging and label manufacturers, and Radex – a startup company owned by multiple stakeholders with a long track record in the field of DOD inkjet digital printing, today announced the launch of Mouvent, a joint venture that will become the digital printing competence center and solutions provider of BOBST. Mouvent, which is comprised of 80 employees in Switzerland, will focus on inventing and delivering the future of digital printing.

Central to the digital innovation at Mouvent is an ingenious digital printing technology developed by Radex, which is based on a highly integrated cluster and represents a quantum leap for the industry. Thanks to its intelligent and compact design, it will be the centerpiece of revolutionary new machines developed by Mouvent for a wide variety of markets such as textile, labels, corrugated board, flexible packaging, folding carton and more.

“We truly believe this is a watershed moment for the future of digital printing independent of the industry or market,” said Jean-Pascal Bobst, CEO of Bobst Group SA. “Current industry trends – including high demand for digitalization, short runs, fast availability, promotion and versioning, personalized and seasonal products, and increasing sensitivity towards cost and environment – are driving demand for high quality and affordable digital printing machines. Through Mouvent we aim to initiate a quantum leap in this area, ultimately providing the market with what it needs most; highly reliable industrial digital printing on different substrates at a competitive cost.”

As well as the digital printing presses, Mouvent offers a fully integrated, complete solution – it develops, engineers, tests, and industrializes digital printers based on the MouventTM Cluster, it writes the software around the printers, develops inks and coatings for various substrates, as well as providing a full servicing offering. The company is promising a new standard in inkjet label production cost and quality, in ink pricing, head durability, quality and machine performance. Its first machine that has been launched is an innovative, highly productive digital printer for textiles, which prints with up to 8 colors, and there is a full product pipeline to follow.

The innovative cluster design is the base building block for all systems, current and in development. “Our radical new approach is to use a base cluster which is arranged in a modular, scalable matrix instead of having different print bars for different applications and different print width” explains Piero Pierantozzi, Co-Founder of Mouvent. “The Mouvent Cluster is the key technology behind the Mouvent machines, resulting in high optical resolution for a crisp, colorful, very high printing quality, as well as a never-seen-before flexibility and possibilities in terms of machine development. Simplicity is our engineering philosophy.”

Mouvent printers are the smallest digital printers in their category – closer to desktop printing than to traditional analogic printers like flexo – making them very compact, light-weighted and easily accessible. The modular, compact system allows easier settings and start-up with less fine adjustments required resulting in a productivity boost. The compact design has many other benefits, including smaller footprint, faster change-over, simple implementation and low cost.

“We are very excited to start rolling out the pipeline in the months ahead,” said Simon Rothen, CEO of Mouvent. “Today is the announcement of an exciting journey of bringing large-scale digital printing to various industries. The digital printing solutions offered by Mouvent will present new opportunities for all sorts of companies, bringing more flexibility, unmatched productivity, shorter time to market and infinite variation, all with a very compact and energy efficient design. This will revolutionize the digital printing world.”

The Mouvent Team welcomes you to visit their stand A60 Hall 3 during Labelexpo 2017 for the launch of the new digital printing presses for the label industry.

| A Bobst Group release  ||  July 6, 2017   |||

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New Zealand’s top food innovation network is helping fast rising clean-tech company Hydroxsys with its amazing water extraction technologies aimed at mining, dairy and other industries that need water extraction or remediation. New Zealand Food Innovation Network chief executive Alexandra Allan says new membrane technology created by Hydroxsys will increase productivity throughout many industries in New Zealand such as dairying, to produce high value-added products, such as whey protein, more efficiently. This new membrane technology created by Hydroxsys will increase productivity throughout many New Zealand industries, including the dairy industry, to produce high value-added products like whey protein more efficiently. They are also able to help the wider agriculture sector, pharmaceuticals, pulp and paper, textiles and industrial wastewater. “Hydroxsys came to us 18 months ago to utilise equipment we have that is integral to the processing technology they are developing,” Allan says. “Hydroxsys was aware of our FoodBowl set up and we are now renting our membrane plant to Hydroxsys so they may carry out trials at their Auckland premises to validate their new technology before commercialising at the end of the year. “The FoodBowl has a wide range of food processing technology available to allow companies to produce new products and try new processing methods, either by coming to The FoodBowl near Auckland Airport, or through renting the technology to use at their own premises. “This is a cool flexible arrangement which means companies are able to innovate at their own premises or The FoodBowl, depending on what suits them best for their application. “The FoodBowl and wider New Zealand Food Innovation Network is dialling up innovation and entrepreneurship in the New Zealand food and beverage industry through enabling companies to commercialise new products on local and global markets. “We will be helping industry this year to develop capability on the latest new technologies such as high-pressure processing and areas of global market growth such as bioactives which is an area New Zealand has many special advantages because of our native flora and fauna,” Allan says. Hydroxsys has raise about $3 million in investment funding from people and organisations such as the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund, Sparkbox and K1W1 (Sir Stephen Tindall’s investment fund). Hydroxsys has developed a platform technology approach for the membrane market and has sound technology so it can be a leader in markets such as China, the United States, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Where organisations and businesses must treat waste streams before discharge, Hydroxsys can be relevant. The New Zealand Food Innovation Network is an accessible, national network of science and technology resources created to support the growth and development of New Zealand food and beverage business of all sizes or providing facilities and the expertise needed to develop new products and process from idea to commercial success. Its network is working closely with science, technology and export partners to grow capability.

| A Make Lemonade rrelease  ||  July 6,  2017   |||

British bike manufacturer Orro have released the all new Terra C model road bike this month. Featuring sigmaIF – a combination of Innegra™ and Sigmatex carbon fibres, to produce a completely redesigned frame.

Orro’s mission is to create the best and most stylish bikes for serious riders. Their headquarters in Ditchling at the foot of the Sussex Downs, provides an area of outstanding natural beauty; an inspiration and a perfect testing ground for their bikes.

The Terra C is one of several bikes in the Orro range that feature Sigmatex carbon technology. The Terra C has a lightweight frame, tyre clearance and geometry aimed at the emerging adventure riding scene, while retaining the speed and handling of a road bike. Offering the same light weight performance as more traditional carbon fibre reinforcements, sigmaIF offers improved impact resistance and damping properties – absorbing energy and reducing vibrations, which makes for a smoother ride.

“sigmaIF is so versatile and we have been able to completely customise the fibres to improve the strength in critical areas to ward off rock strikes and other such impacts.” – Orro.

In addition to cycling, sigmaIF has been the chosen solution for a diverse range of sporting applications including paddle boards, ice hockey sticks and surfboards. sigmaIF has a greater damage tolerance which reduces failure in such applications where impact resistance is essential.

| A Sigmatex release  ||  July 5,  2017   |||

WaterSaver is a New Zealand designed and manufactured device and was the brainchild of  Nelson based Jon Taylor.  In this article he talks to the NZ Entrepreneur magazine on the WaterSaver's path to market  [. . .]

Scion is to investigate the feasibility of remediating treated timber with government funding of $163,000, Associate Environment Minister Scott Simpson announced today.

Chromated copper arsenate (CCA) is a preservative for timber that has been commonly used in New Zealand since the 1950s. However, CCA-treated timber becomes a hazardous waste material when sent to landfill, that can leach arsenic into the ground.

“To date, there have been no practical remediation options available to this problem, so I am delighted that Scion believes they may have one and that I am able to support them in testing its feasibility,” Mr Simpson says.

“This study could provide New Zealand with an opportunity to divert CCA-treated timber from landfills and offer an environmentally friendly solution reusing both the wood fibre and the extracted metals.”

A 2013 report suggested that currently between 12,000 and 42,000 tonnes of treated timber could be sent to landfills nationally per annum, not including the significant estimated nationwide contribution of rural waste.

The grant, provided through the Waste Minimisation Fund, will fund a two year project, based in Rotorua.

The Waste Minimisation Fund provides financial support to projects that reduce environmental harm and provide social, economic and cultural benefits. It is funded from a levy introduced by the National-led Government in 2009, which is charged on waste disposed of at landfills to discourage waste and to fund recycling initiatives. Over $80 million has been awarded to more than 130 projects to date.

| A beehive release  ||  July 3,  2017   |||

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