Electric motor designer and software developer ECM PCB Stator Technology made a public release for the software-as-a-service (SaaS) version of its PrintStator Motor CAD at the 2024 Consumer Electronics Show, the annual event that is a launch platform for new developments in technology-focused product design and engineering.
At the same event in Las Vegas this week, ECM was named a CES Innovation Awards Honoree for PrintStator, its patented technology for printed circuit board stators.
Stators are stationary components of a rotary motor that transfer electric energy through the controller to the motor shaft, defining its speed and torque. While conventional stators are comprised of coiled wire, which generate heat and absorb the stress of the operation, ECM PCB Stator Tech’s innovation is to replace the copper windings with a much lighter, printed circuit board – applying the concept that engineers frequently use to link individual components of electrical systems.
PrintStator software is a ‘design-to-manufacture tool’ for electric motor developers and builders. As a SaaS offering, it allows companies with manufacturing capacity to advance their designs immediately to production. PrintStator users without manufacturing capability will be able to use the SaaS to leverage the global capacity for PCB production and source customized electric motors.
Needham, Mass.-based ECM explained that “From the cloud-based interface, PrintStator users can dial-in precise performance and dimensional specs to create custom electric motor solutions for multiple verticals: consumer electronics, HVAC, E-mobility, medical, robotics, aerospace, and more.”
“PrintStator Motor CAD uniquely enables a ‘motor as software’ product, mobilizing unprecedented rapid innovation within the global electric motor industry,” according to CEO Brian Casey. “Within minutes, PrintStator’s SaaS platform optimizes user specs into PCB Stator motor solutions. Those PCB design files can then be printed immediately worldwide, facilitating vertical or local manufacturing.”
Designers and innovators at CES 2024 have been invited to sample various advantages of the PrintStator SaaS platform, including design precision and speed, manufacturing simplicity, and design flexibility. “PrintStator offers innovators unapparelled design optimization. If a global electronics manufacturer needs a 1.62 horsepower appliance motor that achieves 94% efficiency, conforms to an exact form factor, and complies with regional regulatory requirements, PrintStator can design that,” according to Casey.
He further noted that “the need for specialized electric motors is an overlooked technology trend. The world will require billions of specialized motors annually—in every vertical imaginable—designed precisely to specs for performance, efficiency, and size. In ECM’s view, the best way to serve that electric motor future is to offer PrintStator Motor CAD to the public as SaaS.”
