Anaheim, Calif. — Cinova Medical and Arburg Inc. have announced a partnership to establish a medical technology and training center at Cinova's campus in Phoenix to provide digital molding solutions for the medical device and pharmaceutical industries.
The collaboration creates "a place for Arburg to showcase new intellectual property, new machines [and] new equipment," David Mabie, executive vice president and operating partner at Cinova, told Plastics News at MD&M West in Anaheim. "Everything that they bring into the United States will land in Cinova Medical first."
Cinova's medical technology and training center will be focused on providing digital molding solutions to the medical device and pharmaceutical industries. Arburg will provide Cinova Medical with injection molding equipment and work with its team to improve digital connection, a news release said.
The medical supplier, formerly known as Flambeau Medical, has been "getting a lot of traction with the major medical device OEMs," Mabie said. "We will be looking at manufacturing that people want to pull out of Asia, let's just say, and bring it back into the United States."
One of the center's first projects, which could take up to five years, Mabie said, is to develop a "smart molding machine" using artificial intelligence for mold validations.
"Using Arburg's existing ALS software as a foundation, we will bring artificial intelligence to the machines and all connected, ancillary equipment so that all pieces of equipment are communicating with one another," Mabie said in a recent letter to customers.
The company is now in "team formation mode," he added. "Cinova will be hiring a chief technology officer and additional process engineers with strong software engineering backgrounds.
"This is all very early stage," Mabie said. "There are a lot of companies that Arburg could partner with, but we have some pretty tech-savvy people on our board of directors who are helping guide us by bringing in chief technology officers and software engineers.
"We have an immediate need for a new program manager and a new quality manager," Mabie said. "We still would love to add one or two more skilled machinists to the team. We are actively pursuing those positions now [and] we will continue to hire people.
"Our industry needs partnerships that go deeper than traditional supplier-buyer relationships," Mabie said in the release. "We will introduce proprietary developed advanced learning software that will bring products to market safer and faster with real time quality information."
In November 2024, Cinova announced it had purchased two new Arburg injection molding machines — the 165-ton 520 E and 220-ton 570 Golden Electric machine — and Arburg robots for end-of-arm tooling. The machines will be housed in the supplier's Class 8 clean room.
"We are happy to support Cinova Medical as they are building up their new plant in Arizona," Martin Baumann, president of Arburg Inc., said in the release. "In addition to supporting them with their molding facility, we are also providing support for a training facility. Availability of skilled labor in our industry is a significant challenge, and we are tackling this issue together."