tomorrow
Schaeffler
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Autonomous Driving
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Between anode and cathode: the future
Every watt counts
Team up on self-driving shuttles
Science vs. Fiction
What will the car of the future consist of?
Rallying without a steering column
Hinterland on the move
New ways to navigate the city
Looking at the future on a car lift
Mobile medicine
Engineering
Robotics
Sensor Technology
Mechanical Systems
Industrial Automation
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Transformers
The art of making plates
Not all approaches are successful
Strong through cooperation
“It could work out! If …”
“The world of work is being upended”
Be brave!
Surviving in extreme environments
Houston, we have a garbage problem
All ducks in a row
Think Green
Wind Power
Renewable Energies
Energy Storage
CO
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Efficiency
Energy Distribution
Sustainability
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Smart solutions for cleaner flying
Double benefit
Wastewater as a resource
Winds aloft and Herculean forces
The oceanic world – how much do you know about it?
Economy in a circle
Space-based electric power – a viable option?
Sand is becoming scarce!
Six innovative lifesavers
“Recalibrating, reinventing – in all directions”
Digital
Industry 4.0
AI
Connectivity
Design
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The power of soft
High-tech ID
Virtual testing for tough reality
Is ultrafast satellite internet on the horizon?
The AI revolution
“A world of work with mixed robo-human teams would be a major step forward.”
Logistic Rubik’s Cube
Team players wanted
Quantum Computing coming soon
Light show
Future Life
Urbanization
Globalization
New Work
Everyday Life
Diversity
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Rising Stars
Lift off, please!
The Line
Quiz your way through the world of tomorrow!
Welcome to the holofants
Old masters in a digital guise
That makes sense
Hello, holo!
SciFi Kids
“Less but better”
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Engineering
Transformers
With every additional level of automation, robots assume more of a key role in industrial settings. Like other industries, automotive manufacturers rely on automatic helpers in the transformation process more than ever before.
The art of making plates
Schaeffler is demonstrating its development capabilities in the field of hydrogen-powered mobility with a new generation of metallic bipolar plates for polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells.
Not all approaches are successful
From turbines to nuclear power, from promising to bizarre – a compendium of the variety of powertrains from 150 years of automotive history.
Strong through cooperation
The Schaeffler Hubs for Advanced Research (SHARE) have been linking industry and leading universities for ten years – a success story that began in 2013 at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is celebrating its anniversary.
“It could work out! If …”
Transformation, change, strengthening resilience – how does that work? Andreas Hoberg, production expert and business consultant, classifies priorities and vocabulary.
“The world of work is being upended”
Fraunhofer research scientist Professor Roman Dumitrescu, Director of the Product Development Research Unit, explains why engineering excellence is becoming an increasingly important resilience factor for businesses.
Be brave!
Traits that characterize captains at the helm of a ship in a storm include resilience and pragmatism. What can people at the helm of businesses learn from mariners in terms of resilience? Quite a bit, says maritime expert Stefan Kruecken.
Surviving in extreme environments
They’re found in volcanic rock, in the deepest submarine canyons and under the ice of Antarctica: creatures called extremophiles that are highly resilient in extreme conditions.
Houston, we have a garbage problem
The number of satellites in space is rising rapidly. But what if these high-tech objects go to pot? Then they orbit the Earth at high speed as dangerous space debris. To make the orbit resilient for the future, a clean-up mission is needed.
All ducks in a row
Fully automatic and highly efficient: That’s how warehouses have become critical hubs of resilient supply chains.
World of materials - how well do you know your stuff?
How many tons of sand does a normal family home actually consume? What "plastic" gamechanger does the start-up Traceless Materials have in its hands? Immerse yourself in the world of materials! Test your knowledge in our tech quiz!
Joining forces for faster findings
The world’s 40 richest countries spend a total of 1.2 trillion euros per year on research and development. The money has been invested particularly effectively when academia and business act hand in hand.
Historic pioneering deeds - how well do you know them?
What groundbreaking invention did gardener Joseph Monier present at the 1867 World’s Fair in Paris? And what was Albert Einstein’s profession when he came up with his “E = mc²” formula in 1905? Immerse yourself in the world of inventors!
Schaeffler’s visionaries
How can the transportation sector become more sustainable? And how can Schaeffler accelerate that transformation? Those questions are among the ones that the specialists in Schaeffler’s Advanced Innovation department address and explore.
And the winner is … the team
A look at the Nobel Prizes that have been awarded since 1901 shows how important teamwork is in the areas of research, development and science. In many cases, the work of two or three individuals is selected as the winner of the prestigious award.
Little and larger helpers
The evolution of robots is rapidly picking up momentum. The worker-bees among them are becoming more powerful and ruggedized, liberating their human colleagues from hard and hazardous work. A status report from the world of machines.
Ghostbusters in freezing cold
Neutrinos are referred to as ghost particles. To track them down, ultrasensitive detectors are set up in extreme locations – for instance in the Antarctic. Read below how Schaeffler helps research scientists with their neutrino experiments.
Caution! Fakes!
Product piracy costs billions: Not only due to lost sales but also because of potential damage due to inferior quality of counterfeits. The consequences are complex – just like the countermeasures.
Game changers
Do you know to whom we owe the zipper, industrial paper production or ferroconcrete? Nine brief, exciting portraits of people without whose pioneering spirit today’s world would be a different one.
A matriarch with foresight
Will she rise to the challenge? This question occurred to many observers when Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler took the helm of the company in 1996. Today, 25 years later, the answer is: yes, she did.
Be robots and multiply
Robots multiplying themselves – that sounds like science fiction but is a reality. These automatic machines, however, are really tiny.
Self-driving weed killer
Researchers from Fraunhofer have now presented an autonomous weeding robot requiring neither sprays nor costly high-tech sensors including complex algorithms.
In motion for the last 75 years
It is one of the greatest “Made in Germany” success stories: The global automotive and industrial supplier Schaeffler is celebrating its 75th anniversary today.
The universal inspectors
X-rays, as any child knows, are used to see inside the body. That thanks to new high-tech computed tomography the technology plays an important role in industry too is a less known fact.
Directly to your door!
Billions of letters and parcels are sent every year. To do this, the deliverers rely on state-of-the-art machines and digital technologies. A look into the gears of global logistics chains.
Steel with a shade of green
A modern world without steel is hardly conceivable – but steel without CO
2
emissions is. These are the technologies to achieve change.
Rolling through the ages
It’s one of the world’s most important inventions and has been making the everyday lives of humans easier for nearly 6,000 years: the wheel.
Less is more
Almost a fourth of the energy consumed is lost to friction. It’s time to change that – with new surface technologies.
In touch with the stars
The most important passenger on board of the jumbo jet called SOFIA is a space telescope.
High tech in the fields
Farming feeds the world – and requires increasingly better and, above all, more efficient machines to do so.
A perfect give and go
As an innovation leader, Schaeffler is already researching the technologies of tomorrow together with universities, institutes, and research facilities.
Smartly steered
Schaeffler’s intelligent mechatronic rear axle steering system ensures greater agility, driving comfort and safety with maximum energy efficiency.
In the making
15,000 square meters of footprint, 15 high-tech laboratories: Herzogenaurach will soon be home to “Schaeffler’s Central Laboratory”. “tomorrow” talked to Prof. Dr.-Ing. Tim Hosenfeldt.
For a better India
On a fast track to becoming an economic superpower: with agile thinking and advanced technology, India might be ranking among the world’s top three economies by 2030.
Of players and helpers
Automaton, machine, robot, humanoid, android, cobot – no matter what names the artificial entertainers have been given, the foundations of this success story were laid as far back as 3,000 years ago.
An innovative solution
Hybrid or all-electric systems are complementing or replacing conventional powertrains. Schaeffler has developed a modular e-axle kit enabling an extensive, universal product portfolio.
A stroke of genius
70 years ago, Dr.-Ing. E. h. Georg Schaeffler filed a patent application for the cage-guided needle roller bearing that has revolutionized bearing technology until today.
On a roll
Friction is a decelerator. Who’d be in a better position to know this than bearing specialist Schaeffler? Weight and aerodynamic drag hamper the urge of moving forward as well.
The future wound in a coil
Be it in cars, trains or airplanes, in systems ranging from hybrid to fully electric, mobility of the future requires electric motors. But how does an electric motor actually work?
Preventive action
The transformation toward e-mobility doesn’t stop at the gates of the spare parts market. Schaeffler Automotive Aftermarket is gearing up for the demands of tomorrow.
Goodbye to errors
Downtimes are poison for business. The best strategy to prevent this is a smart early warning system. It’s called condition monitoring.
A win-win situation
When business and science successfully work together, hands-on knowledge from the industrial world is combined with academic findings. But how do such university-business partnerships succeed?
The end of the cage age
Cobots, the smaller siblings of gross-motor industrial robots, are making a name for themselves. The specialists at Schaeffler have found a way to make them perform faster and with greater precision.
One thing after the other
More than a hundred years ago, the moving assembly line changed the manufacturing process: an awesome success story – and one that could soon be ending.
The enablers
Schaeffler’s success story is closely linked to its own production landscapes. Without the equipment from its in-house mechanical engineering department, Schaeffler’s plants would stop operating.
Grandpa’s Journey to the Moon
The future was never brighter and enthusiasm for technology never greater than during the brief period between the eve of the 20th century and the outbreak of the First World War.
How ideas turn into success
Ideas need people who believe in them and make them reality. Four examples described illustrate how Schaeffler manages to transfer innovative stimuli into successful projects.
The journey of the giants
Before wind turbines are able to generate electricity at dizzying heights they have to complete an arduous journey. The transportation of wind power systems is packed with challenges.
This man loves challenges
London, Paris, Madrid – what sounds like the stops on a tour of a TV commercial for hairspray in the late 1980s may also at times be hairy routine for Christian Schuster.
Impeccably round and smooth
No bearing would rotate without perfectly shaped steel spheres. A manufacturing technology feat whose beginnings date back more than 130 years – and that today ensures proper rotation.
The da Vinci formula
No other artist and engineer who passed away a long time ago fascinates us as much as Leonardo da Vinci. However, innovation prowess was the result of very specific principles of success.
The world machines
Physicists use particle accelerators to smash tiniest particles against each other in a quest for new answers to humanity’s big questions.
Steely farmhands
Machine hall vs. mini vehicle fleet – a visit to two highly diverse agricultural operations in Brazil.
The subtle difference
Are men interested in machines and women are not? Before this question provokes a public outcry, it’s worth taking a look at a few statistics and the changes that are currently taking place.
Midgets with potential
The 2016 Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded for the fundamentals of building complex nanomachines. Following the early eighties, this new field of research has since seen rapid development.
Game changer
Twelve machines that have decisively driven the development of the world.
Connecting links
They take us across rivers and valleys, connect city districts and cross other roads – whenever motion might be obstructed, bridges pave the way – like these prime examples of their kind.