Kinematics is our specialty

History

From data mining to ASOM

info-key was founded in 2001 at the University of Wuppertal, supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and by the university’s “bizeps” start-up project. Our first line of business was data mining: for ABB, DURA Automotive Systems, EMITEC, Erbslöh, MAHLE, S Broker, WKW and other companies, we analyzed large amounts of data and revealed hidden relationships.

Early on, we turned to artificial intelligence. In 2003, the Bergisch Innovation Award gave us the distinction “Product with high innovation potential” for AI in mechanical engineering. In 2007, the START‑AWARD NRW was presented for the first time. We won first prize in the category “Successful young companies founded by immigrants,” in recognition of our entrepreneurial achievement in data mining. In the PONNGA research project (“Optimizing product development using neural networks and graphical visualization of requirements”) of the BMBF, we worked with RWTH Aachen University and industrial partners such as BÖCO, Ford and Huf Hülsbeck & Fürst to develop a recommendation system in which neural networks suggested suitable product solutions to design engineers.

At the same time, our second line of business grew: kinematics. It goes back to 2000: for Volkswagen and KICO, we developed the KinSynth program. The goal was to design the four-bar linkage and the gas spring together in one system instead of treating them separately, as had been usual until then. The second development stage achieved exactly that. Volkswagen used this stage in the development of the Eos.

This experience gave rise to ASOM, short for analysis, synthesis and optimization of multi-bar linkages. ASOMv4 was a new development: much more interactive than KinSynth, with optimization and many other functions. The main new feature was the one-bar linkage, since most applications are one-bar linkages. With this version, ASOM changed from a commission for a single customer into a product that any company can license.

ASOMv7 added further syntheses in 2010, for example for six-bar linkages. Since then, ASOM has covered all planar multi-bar linkages. During the same period, we worked with Volkswagen and RWTH Aachen University in the INNOS research project (“Innovative synthesis concept for multi-bar linkages”) on a method for designing six-bar linkages graphically and in real time. The project was funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs under the Central Innovation Programme for SMEs. Volkswagen continuously tested the method on its own development projects.

Since 2014, we have focused entirely on kinematics. Here, the benefits can be shown instead of having to be explained: you see at once how a mechanism moves and which forces and torques act on it. The basic idea of ASOM has been the same from the start: you specify the desired motion, and ASOM creates the right linkage.

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