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Fueling Global Demand for Interface Solutions

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Increasing demand for quality, accurate and reliable sensor technologies is global.  Interface products are used on every continent and across all types of industries. As manufacturers and product innovators make advances in what they build and test, there is a direct correlation to the growth in precision test and measurement tool requirements we supply.

The overall sensor market in 2022 is expected to continue its fast past growth, estimated between 8-12% across all types of sensors. In force measurement, this pace is consistent with the experience in the global markets we serve in Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, Europe, Middle East, South and North America.

Represented by hundreds of sensors experts around the world, Interface distributors continue to experience growth in market share and Interface product users.  In fact, Interface’s fastest growing markets are represented in our global network.  Solutions that utilize our precision load cells, torque transducers, multi-axis load cells and instrumentation are all experiencing high growth worldwide.

What is impacting the greatest international growth for all types of sensors technologies?  According to market analysis and based on Interface’s experience, it’s being fed by:

  1. Miniaturization of Products and Sensors Used in Testing and OEMs
  2. Industrial Automation and Robotics
  3. Innovation in Aerospace and Automotive
  4. IoT – Internet of Things

Our direct experience in demand for Interface solutions outside of the US is related to these areas and specifically new products and expanding use cases. First, we recently launched our Global G Series products to meet this demand. This specialty product is sold exclusively outside the US. These products are designed and manufactured in the International System of Units (SI), with the same precision and accuracy of all Interface products.

The Global G Series is a global standard product line that is designed for applications that require miniature load cells and for OEM solutions used for automation of machines and components.  The markets that are experiencing the highest growth internationally include:

For example, innovative markets like electric vehicles and hydro-electric energy are growing rapidly domestically and in international markets. These industries rely on force testing to optimize these new technologies.

The Asia-Pacific market is currently our fastest growing market. Interface provides products for this market across all industries including automotive, aerospace, test and measurement and more. As mentioned above, the alternative energy, aerospace and electric vehicle market is a big area for Interface and the Asia-Pacific plays a big role in these areas.

Electric vehicle design and manufacturing requires a precise level of accuracy to improve energy efficiency, minimize weight and maximize vehicle range. For instance, battery technology is a major global focus; therefore, maximizing power output using force testing is the key to improving vehicle design. To achieve this, test and measurement solutions need to be as accurate as possible. Interface also provides high accuracy torque transducers, load cells, load washers and more for two areas of electric vehicle testing: laboratory testing to optimize system performance and production testing to ensure product quality.

Another application for force measurement in Europe is force testing on off-shore hydro-electric power plants. This is a great fit for Interface because we have developed an entire lineup of load cells and other products that are submersible. For this project specifically, we provided submersible WMC load cells. This is one example of an innovative application for renewable energies, and this is another market that is growing rapidly both domestically and internationally.

One of the consistent top selling products in both regions and industries are wireless load cells. In our 2022 Test and Measurement Industry Trends blog, detailed some of this growing demand for wireless force measurement solutions. Wireless systems are helping manufacturers simplify the integration process and create a cleaner safer test environment with far less wiring. It is especially helpful in industries like aerospace or automotive, where large factories want to transmit data across the facility without needing a mess of wires getting in the way.

For wireless needs, Interface supplies its Wireless Telemetry System (WTS) which offers sensor transmitters, receivers, and displays. High accuracy, high quality measurement is interfaced with simple yet powerful configuration and monitoring software and gives sensor manufacturers and integrators the complete flexibility to build their own sensor modules around it. The system easily replaces wired systems, reducing installation and maintenance costs.

One area that Interface is also investing in internally is recalibration services to serve all customers across the world. Many of our customers are becoming more aware of and utilizing these services, as we are continuing to grow this capability amongst international customers who are utilizing Interface products for the first time.

Interface’s presence in the international market is growing quickly. Interface is looking forward to seeing where and how we can supply the best in force measurement solutions to enable innovation around the world.

Source: Tyler Pettit, Application Engineer International Markets

Interface Promotes Key Leaders to Expand Services, New Markets and Innovations

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Interface, the world’s trusted leader in technology, design, and manufacturing of force measurement solutions, announced this month key leadership changes within the organization. Ian James was promoted to chief operating officer (COO), Brian Peters was promoted to vice president of Global Sales, and the role of Mark Weathers, vice president of Interface’s Mini and 1923 Wireless products, is now leading advanced manufacturing and OEM solutions. These executive promotions are key steps to drive Interface’s sustained growth across multiple product lines, as well as its expansion into new markets and industries.

“Ian, Brian and Mark represent our breadth of leadership within our organization,” said Greg Adams, CEO, Interface. “In alignment with our entire Interface team, they are instrumental in growing our position as the leader in premium, accurate, and reliable force measurement solutions. Our company is fueled by our dedicated employees and I am honored to be part of their continuous efforts and commitment to provide the high-quality products and an exceptional customer experience for all of those we serve.”

Despite disruptions caused by the global pandemic in 2020, Interface continued to find new ways to help customers across multiple industries. The company launched one of its most innovative load cell products to date in ConvexBT, and expanded manufacturing and global sales of its international G Series SI-based load cell product line. Interface also expanded its automation and high volume, engineered-to-order production capabilities, and added manufacturing representatives GenTek and Hill and Company to improve in-market sales support in the U.S.

Ian James is a seasoned senior executive with a background in manufacturing and systems. After spending the early part of his career in the UK military, he held a series of senior roles in GE before founding two successful startups. He has worked with Interface since late 2017, most recently as vice president of sales. In his new role as COO, James sees his primary challenge and opportunity as leading the transformation of operations to a new and robust manufacturing model that will help the company serve its customers with world class products supported by an unbeatable customer experience.

Brian Peters served as a successful regional sales manager before his promotion to vice president of Global Sales. Peters is now responsible for the worldwide sales network for Interface, including U.S. manufacturing representatives and international distributors. Stepping into his new role, Peters looks forward to bringing over a decade of direct experience to steer Interface’s continued efforts of industry leading customer support and targeted market growth in the test and measurement, industrial applications, and OEM markets.

“As we navigate the current dynamic landscape, it’s critical that we remain agile to stay in front of changing market demands and customer requirements,” said Peters. “Our diversification across a wide range of industries has provided us both stability through the pandemic and wide-reaching insight as markets are recovering. Interface has already experienced ramping growth in early 2021, and our ability to outpace and out service our competition will be vital to Interface maintaining the gold standard expectations set by our customers and the force measurement industry as a whole.”

Mark Weathers has extended his leadership role in Interface’s focus on automation and OEM (original equipment manufacturer) business solutions. His expanded role is a result of his continued achievements as vice president of Interface’s Mini and 1923 Wireless production groups, where he has been able to cut lead times for some of Interface’s higher volume products by 50% or more. This title change reflects the company’s new strategic priorities of growing its higher-volume custom OEM business, and the closely related improvement of its technology and manufacturing processes to improve cost and performance.

“The VP of Advanced Manufacturing and OEM products is an extension of my former role as VP of Mini and 1923, which are largely OEM products. My role will be to prepare us to be more competitive by innovating in both product and process, resulting in cost positions that allow us to move into higher volume OEM applications,” said Mark Weathers, vice president of advanced manufacturing and OEM products.

NEWS ARTICLE: Interface Promotes Three, Expanding Roles for Innovations, Services and New Markets

PRESS RELEASE: Force Measurement Solutions Leader Interface Announces Executive Promotions Supporting its Continued Growth and Expansion

Interface Continues Expansion in International Markets

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Interface is well-known across the U.S. for being the leading provider of premium force measurement products. We are heralded for our products’ and systems’ accuracy and reliability from coast to coast, and tens of thousands of manufacturers, test labs and more use our equipment every day to verify designs and test hardware.

However, did you know that Interface also has a strong presence in international markets including Europe, China, India and more? Interface has a long history of serving customers around the world. Our global outreach is supported by a very formidable network of distributors who work in-market to help customers with their force measurement needs.

In a continued effort to meet the global demands for precision sensor solutions, we have expanded our reach to customers across all continents to deliver the Interface products. In fact, despite the challenges of the past year, we had our best year in China in Interface’s 52-year history. Additionally, we’ve had substantial growth each month, and at the start of 2021 in global sales in APAC, LATAM and EMEA. We are at parity with our domestic sales in fulfilling demand.

Our growth in these markets is due to a concerted effort to speak directly with customers across these regions and find out more about their specific needs. Prior to the pandemic, we were attending more shows than ever and visiting customer sites internationally more frequently. Now, as like most of the world, we are conducting business around the clock via online meetings and with a hyper-focus on listening, learning and feedback mechanisms.

One of the direct results of these efforts was the creation of our Global Standard® Force Measurement (G Series) offering. Due to the increased requests for its high-precision, high-accuracy and high-reliability force measurement sensors designed and manufactured in the International System of Units (SI), commonly known as the metric system, Interface launched the new International G Series product lineup in August 2020.

The G Series debuted with Interface’s most popular Mini™ load cells, enabling international customers to purchase these Global Standard Force Measurement products through the company’s large network of more than 37 distributors outside of the United States. You can locate a distributor in your area here. These products are the first Interface manufactured products near market. The facility’s proximity to core markets in Asia shortens the time and cost for customers to receive quality Interface products.

The G Series products available today include:

GLBM Series Load Button Load Cells – The GLBM Series Load Button Load Cells are strain gauge-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type provides a range of capacities up to 200kN with better than ±0.5% (full scale) non-linearity.

GSMTM Series Mini™ S-Beam Load Cell – The GSMTM Series Miniature S-Type Load Cells are a bi-directional aluminum strain gauge-based transducer with high performance and built-in temperature compensation. This design provides better than ±0.1% (full scale) non-linearity and includes overload protection in both tension and compression directions.

GWMC Series Mini™ Threaded In-Line Load Cells (10kN – 50kN) -The GWMC Series Miniature Threaded In-Line Load Cells are strain gauge-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type measures tensile and compressive loads up to 50kN with better than ±0.5% non-linearity.

GWMC Series Mini™ Threaded In-Line Load Cells (200N – 5000N) – The GWMC Series Miniature Threaded In-Line Load Cells are strain gauge-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type measures tensile and compressive loads up to 5000N with better than ±0.25% non-linearity.

In addition to the G Series product line, we are also evaluating new low-cost solutions that continue to meet Interface’s signature accuracy and reliability for our international markets. What we are hearing from our global customers about new solution requirements that range from middle ground low-cost, low-reliability force measurement products to Interface’s more premium jumbo or specialty product options.

To learn more about Interface and its solutions for international customers, please visit us at www.interfaceforce.com. Additionally, you can find the G Series solutions here: www.interfaceforce.com/global/.

Contributor:  Lloyd Fisher, VP International Sales

Interface Outlook for 2021

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Interface CEO Greg Adams shares his outlook for the coming year.

Never in our collective lives have we faced so much uncertainty and turmoil! The year 2020 will make history, that much is certain. Between the COVID-19 pandemic, social unrest, and a year of political strife for the ages, I think we’re all ready to turn the chapter on the start of this decade.

Despite the challenges we’ve faced in 2020, I’m still very optimistic about our future, and for Interface. My optimism is fueled by the amazing people we have here at Interface.

As a family, we’ve gotten through this together and are only growing stronger. I couldn’t be prouder of our people for their resilience and hard work in the past year. We have continued to provide the same excellent service our customers appreciate. In fact, our Net Promoter Score® remained above 60 again in our latest 2020 Customer Satisfaction Survey.

Additionally, product quality is higher than ever and we even had a few major product launches this year, including ConvexBT, our most advanced load button load cell ever, and the G Series, a new international Mini™ Load Cell product line. And most importantly, we’ve done all of this by ensuring that the health and safety of everyone is our number one priority.

Our ability to remain successful in the past year is a product of how diversified our end markets remain. We continue to serve a wide variety of critical technology-focused industries including aerospace and defense, automotive, medical, industrial, T&M and more. We have benefited from global diversification as well, stepping up our focus on market leaders around the world. It’s also a testament to our engineers who continue to be future focused on innovation. We’ve developed new and groundbreaking ways to serve customers, and we’ve identified trends to keep us at the bleeding edge in our industry and continuously moving forward.

The last point I’ll make on the year 2020 before looking ahead is that we’ve also taken some of the downtime to improve our internal processes and dedicate time to skills training for our team. Not only have we improved our product lines and capabilities, but we’ve also ensured that our skillsets remain strong going into the next year.

And as we finally make the turn to 2021, I’ve spent some time looking ahead to what I believe the next year will hold for our industry and for Interface:

A heightened focus on pre-sale and post-sales service is one thing that we’ve heard from customers in the last year through our semi-annual surveys. We’re upgrading our sales process to ensure our engineering teams are more involved in assisting the customer select and configure the products and systems that are right for their application. Enhancing our after-sales service will include capturing and distributing instructions, guides, and other technical services into a more accessible and easier to find outlets like our robust website.

Another trend we’re seeing requested from our customers is a desire for force measurement providers to migrate from components to systems. World-class components will always be important, but our experience working with customers to provide total system solutions that meet their specific needs is critical. In addition, the demand for higher performance and more customization options continues. One of the biggest improvements Interface has made in the past year is updating our production lines to include more automation capabilities. This allows us to provide high-performance, customized products at high volume while still being able to offer competitive costs. This change is helping us expand our sales with the OEM customers.

Finally, a big trend we’ve been following is miniaturization and the desire to pack more sensor technology into a single load cell or torque transducer. We’ve already begun to address this in some of our products by designing accelerometers into load cells. In industries like automotive, we often use a torque transducer to measure rotation with components like car engines. By adding an accelerometer, we can measure both rotation and acceleration through a single device.

As this desire for more data and less convoluted test systems grows, Interface will continue to find ways to customize our load cells and add more sensor types like temperature and humidity. We’ll also do this by using electronic miniaturization manufacturing methods to improve capability without increasing the overall size of the package.

In conclusion, I’m extremely pleased with the level of talent, the strength of the brand and the depth of our commitment to customer satisfaction. We’ve overcome the challenges presented to us this year and remain stronger than ever. Our renewed focus on the future will also help us identify opportunities for innovation to serve customers in more unique and beneficial ways.

I hope that everyone in our community, from our partners to our customers and employees, has a wonderful holiday season and comes back in the new year refreshed. We’re not out of the woods yet with the pandemic, but there is light ahead and we are speeding to be the Interface you can always rely on.

Interface Launches Global G Series for International Markets

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Interface has launched a new international Mini™ Load Cell product line, the Global G Series, under it’s new product brand the Global Standard® Force Measurement.

The new miniature load cells were developed to meet the increasing demand for Interface high-precision, accurate and reliable force measurement solutions designed and manufactured in the International System of Units (SI), commonly known as the metric system.

The G Series debuts with Interface’s most popular Mini™ load cells, enabling international customers to purchase these Global Standard Force Measurement products through the company’s large network of distributors exclusively outside of the United States.

“The Interface brand is well-known worldwide for representing the premium standard for precision force and torque solutions. As demand for our products grew globally, we received many requests for SI-based designs of our load cells. We listened to our customers and are proud to launch our first G Series products that are the most popular miniature load cells used in aerospace and defense, automotive, medical and industrial automation industries worldwide.” ,” Greg Adams, CEO, Interface

Interface is manufacturing the Interface G Series lineup in the Asia-Pacific region, to provide customers with a near market advantage and access to the best force measurement solutions available today. Manufacturing these products near demand shortens the time and cost for customers to receive quality Interface products. Every product in the G Series has passed a rigorous Interface quality and engineering testing and calibration protocol to meet the highest in accuracy and quality standards.

The first release of G Series products available today through our global distributor network include:

  • GLBM Series Load Button Load Cells – The GLBM Series Load Button Load Cells are strain gage-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type provides a range of capacities up to 200kN with better than ±0.5% (full scale) non-linearity.
  • GSMTM Series Mini™ S-Beam Load Cell – The GSMTM Series Miniature S-Type Load Cells are a bi-directional aluminum strain gage-based transducer with high performance and built-in temperature compensation. This design provides better than ±0.1% (full scale) non-linearity and includes overload protection in both tension and compression directions.
  • GWMC Series Mini™ Threaded In-Line Load Cells (10kN – 50kN) -The GWMC Series Miniature Threaded In-Line Load Cells are strain gage-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type measures tensile and compressive loads up to 50kN with better than ±0.5% non-linearity.
  • GWMC Series Mini™ Threaded In-Line Load Cells (200N – 5000N) – The GWMC Series Miniature Threaded In-Line Load Cells are strain gage-based transducers with temperature compensation and excellent overall performance. This type measures tensile and compressive loads up to 5000N with better than ±0.25% non-linearity.

For more information about Interface Global Standard G Series solutions and to watch for new products for international markets, please visit www.interfaceforceglobal.com. Interface G Series products are not available for purchase in the United States.