UK Minister for Trade Policy launches Expanded Emulate3D by Rockwell Automation Facility in Reading

13 September, 2019

It provides the company with a more professional development, support and demonstration capacity, and offers a platform to accelerate its expansion into new markets. Building on Rockwell Automation’s close ties to PTC, the Enterprise Centre will be home to the recent Emulate3D CAD is the Model technology which takes the company’s offline emulation technology directly to machine builders.

Opening the site, the Minister said: “Emulate3D is a shining example of UK excellence in the tech sector. Their success demonstrates the potential benefits to UK businesses of exporting and taking advantage of fast-growing overseas markets. Emulate3D has long been part of the Exporting is Great campaign.

Continued expansion

“It is a privilege to officially open these brand-new facilities in Reading, supporting the continued expansion of the business under Rockwell Automation. Emulate3D showcases the very best of UK innovation and capability in this rapidly evolving industry.”

Emulate3D business development manager, Ian McGregor, thanked the minister for helping mark the occasion and welcomed the contribution of the DiT in the company’s expansion journey, “Emulate3D has always been an outward facing company with designs on taking our industrial automation simulation and emulation software technologies out beyond the UK. The DiT has been a huge help for us in opening new export markets and helping us to reduce the risks associated with exporting.”

The company, which was founded in 2005, grew to a team of 20 before being acquired by Rockwell Automation in January of this year. The success of Emulate3D is rooted in innovative software that helps create accurate simulation models to improve systems planning and decision-making in a virtual environment without incurring manufacturing and automation costs before committing to a final design. Having been awarded a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in 2014 and been recognised by Gartner as a “Cool Vendor in the Supply Chain” in 2016, the company has been successfully exporting its technology in the Americas and across Europe.

Now a part of Rockwell Automation and the PTC partner network, further expansion of the UK operation and workforce are in progress as Emulate3D by Rockwell Automation is integrated into the FactoryTalk DesignSuite software offering.

UK country director for Rockwell Automation, Phil Hadfield, sees the expansion of Emulate3D as an important steppingstone as the technology is fast-tracked into industrial enterprises around the world. “The new facilities are the next step in the good-news story for British innovation,” says Hadfield. “And at Rockwell Automation we are excited by the opportunities that Emulate3D software offers our customers throughout the world in this fast-growing aspect of the fourth industrial revolution. Reducing time-to-market and improving operational productivity with simulation solutions as part of our suite of software offerings helps bring the vision of the Connected Enterprise to life and offers further opportunities for our customers to connect the imagination of people with the potential of machines to make the world work better.”

Image  caption -  George Hollingbery MP during the opening of Emulate3D by Rockwell Automation’s brand-new facility at Reading Enterprise Centre.