Behind Mechatronics’ Overnight Success

Many electrical engineers may have just caught the buzz about a discipline called mechatronics, and have heard that it’s going to change their lives. There are good reasons why that’s likely to be the case, and I’ll go into them. But first, I’d like to make clear that many years of hard work have gone into making mechatronics an overnight success.
It was back in 1994 when the term “mechatronics” first came to my attention. Based on some initial research, I wrote an article entitled “Mecha—what?” to explain to EEs what was beginning to happen. In it, I stated that this new discipline was “the synergistic combination of precision mechanical engineering, electronic control, and systems thinking in the design of products and manufacturing processes.” Through no fault of my own, the statement became the official definition of mechatronics adopted by the Industrial Research and Development Advisory Committee of the European Community, and it still seems encapsulated the basic concepts behind mechatronics today. Read more