How to Determine if a Homegrown Controller or an Established Platform Is the Best Choice for Your Machine

The time has come once again for new product design. Your ultimate goal is to enter the market with a new machine in a timely manner. Most importantly, you need something that is reliable. You have completed your research on performance and specifications, and you know which new advancements need to be integrated into your machine to meet your market’s needs. Your value is knowing how to leverage your expertise into this new tool to make it a cutting-edge solution. Lastly, you have a target price of what the market will pay for this new machine.

But, questions still remain. Do you need to start from scratch on this new build or are you able to upgrade the current machine in a significant manner to differentiate it from what currently exists? Can you reuse parts of the previous generation machine like the frame and the electrical cabinets? Do you need to make room for a higher level of automation by adding programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and additional input/output (I/O) devices?