The FIE Foundation recently recognized WIDMATM Machining Solutions Group with its prestigious FIE Foundation Award for an innovative hydraulic fixture exhibited at the 16th Indian Metal-Cutting Machine Tool Exhibition (IMTEX) 2013 in Bangalore. The award acknowledges the latest technical innovations in machine tools exhibited at IMTEX, and aims to appreciate and encourage ideas, innovations, and vision in machine tool technology.

Ongoing innovation and increased knowledge of how machine tools, tooling, and the fixtures that hold the workpiece all interact is required to address the increasingly complex challenges of 21st Century manufacturing. The award-winning WIDMA innovation is a hydraulic fixture that serves as a turnkey solution for fixture tooling, significantly upgrading process optimisation, cycle time efficiency, and quality control on standard machining centres. The complete hydraulic fixture provides proper averaging, location, orientation, part support, and clamping to locate and hold a workpiece rigidly in place on a horizontal machining centre (HMC). By accommodating a complex two-component rear axle housing for first operation (OP10), this innovative fixture design was shown to significantly improve productivity. The fixture has a unique configuration by design and features internal hydraulics for easy chip flow.

IMTEX is an International Machine Tool Exhibition, organized every two years by Indian Machine tool Manufacturing Association. It is Southeast Asia?s biggest machine tool exhibition with participation of well-known companies of Europe, Japan, and the U.S.A., among many others. FIE Foundation takes this opportunity to present awards for latest technical innovations in manufacturing technology exhibited at IMTEX, and the awards are given away in a ceremony during IMTEX. According to the foundation, "Pursuing excellence is the ambition of every human nature. It is an eternal journey - a journey replete with the rich canvas of experience. People who pursue this journey have all exhibited certain canonical attributes, creativity, motivation, hard work, discipline, determination and dedication. Such people serve as great motivation to individuals and corporations all over."

The FIE Foundation is a charity trust established in 1970 and belongs to the well-known FIE Group of Industries of Ichalkaranji, Maharashtra State. The foundation has a sole vision of recognizing and awarding eminent personalities of India in different fields for their contribution to the nation and society, and recognizing and encouraging young talent.