News

The CC-Link Partner Association, an association promoting the industrial open network "CC-Link" (Board of directors: IDEC Corporation, Digital Electronics Corporation, NEC Corporation, Sumitomo 3M Limited, Cognex K.K., Shanghai Electric Ryoden Energy Saving and Control Technology Co., Ltd., Balluff　GmbH and Mitsubishi Electric Corporation), would like to announce that it has a new chairman Mr. Fumihiko Kimura, a professor of Faculty of Science and Engineering at Hosei University. Prof. Kimura is known as a leading person in the production system engineering field and CAD/CAM field in Japan, and his many achievements regarding the development of production systems are highly valued in Japan and even overseas.

It is expected that Prof. Kimura's accession to the chairman, who has been long playing an important role in the cutting-edge area, enhances the CLPA's activities concerning the future of the manufacturing further. For example, Prof. Kimura points out that the production system is now facing a problem "restrictions on energy and resources", and advocates that the new-generation production system concerning energy saving and resource saving must be created. The helm by Prof. Kimura, who has such a clear future vision, will enrich the CLPA's activities to support the development of the manufacturing industry.

Prof. Kimura passed through the doctoral course of the graduate school at the University of Tokyo in 1974, and entered Electrotechnical Laboratory of Agency of Industrial Science and Technology of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. In 1979, he started research on "inverse manufacturing", "life-cycle engineering", and "geometric modeling" at the University of Tokyo. In recent years, he expanded his research area, such as environment-friendly product design (eco design), product life-cycle design for the sustainability of the earth, and the building method of production systems that can flexibly respond to changes. Then, He transferred to Hosei University in 2009. He has been actively engaged in research focusing on the production system engineering, the design engineering, and the life-cycle engineering.

He has held key posts in authoritative international institutes, such as IFIP (International Federation for Information Processing) and CIRP (College International pour la Recherche en Productique (International Academy for Production Engineering in English)), in addition to institutes in Japan including the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME) and the Japan Society for Precision Engineering (JSPE). He also has been engaged with many international standardization activities. For example, he took part in ISO (International Organization for Standardization)/TC184 as a representative of Japan. He also played an important role as a leader in "IMS (Intelligent Manufacturing Systems)", which is a big international project for establishing a new-generation intelligent production system.

<Award>
JSME MEDAL for the Best Papers (1980), IFIP 20th-year Anniversary Best Paper Award (1980), JSPE Best Paper Award (1986 and 1988), JSPE Prize (1993 and 2011), IFIP Silver Core Award (1994), JSME Manufacturing Systems Award (1997), Prize from the Minister of International Trade and Industry (2000), JSME Design & Systems Achievement Award (2003), IMS Achievement Award (2005), JSME Codes and Standards Award for Distinguished Contribution (2008), Medal with Blue Ribbon (2011), JSME Design & Systems Award (2012)

Contact address
CC-Link Partner Association - Japan Head Office
6F Ozone-front Building, 3-15-58, Ozone, Kita-ku, Nagoya 462-0825, Japan
TEL:052-919-1588 / FAX:052-916-8655
Homepage URL:http://cc-link.org/