CapEx Sales, LLC

10/26/2026

Humanoid robots may be one of the most visible areas of robotics development, but their ultimate role in manufacturing could depend less on their resemblance to people and more on whether that form is actually appropriate for the work. In the debut episode of Robots Today, a new companion series to ASSEMBLY’s The Future Is Robotic, International Federation of Robotics President Jane Heffner discusses where humanoids could fit on factory floors and where manufacturers may be better served by other forms of automation.

In the debut episode of The Future is Robotic | Robots Today, International Federation of Robotics President Jane Heffner explains where humanoids could have an advantage, why purpose-built robots still make more sense for many manufacturing tasks and why safety remains a major hurdle.

10/26/2026

10/23/2026

The past few years have been a stress test for manufacturing supply chains. Export controls, commodity price spikes, geopolitical disruption, and competition for critical materials have exposed how quickly constraints on essential inputs can slow growth. As a result, linear production models based on the availability of abundant and predictable resource flows are less viable. Instead, many manufacturers are shifting to more circular production models.

A new survey finds that manufacturers are increasingly embracing circular production models to address material shortages, strengthen supply chains and improve long-term competitiveness.

10/22/2026

Ridge Security researchers recently discovered CVE-2026-42542, a high-severity vulnerability in TDengine, a time-series database used in industrial IoT, manufacturing, energy, connected vehicles and other environments that rely on machine and sensor data. The basic problem involves an unauthenticated attacker being able to crash a TDengine server with a single malformed packet. No credentials, session or user interaction are required. Ridge has not yet observed exploitation or identified any attack IOCs. However, AI-aided vulnerability discovery and chaining have substantially changed the security equation, and the pace of exploitation is only expected to increase.

'This is a one-packet, no-password kill switch on a database that quietly runs a lot of critical infrastructure.'

10/21/2026

🔄 Your Wednesday Reboot is here!

This week, explore focused leak testing, simplified, with the Sentinel BC5/IC5. Plus, learn how accountability can help make daily huddles more effective and keep your team moving forward.

👉 Read the latest from CapEx: https://conta.cc/488Icv0

10/20/2026

Tech startup Feather Robotics Inc. has introduced a humanoid robot for less than $30,000.

The Feather robot is a two-armed mobile humanoid built as an open platform for physical AI. Each arm can move in seven degrees of freedom. The robot has a vertical reach of 600 millimeters and a horizontal reach of 1 meter. The rated payload for each arm is 4 pounds, and the peak payload is 15 pounds.

EAST PALO ALTO, CA—Tech startup Feather Robotics Inc. has introduced a humanoid robot for less than $30,000.

10/19/2026

North America’s once mighty automotive tool-and-die industry has been waning for 30 years, with shops closing, workers retiring and the supply chain moving to Asia. Now the crisis has reached the point that American companies cannot “launch, redesign or refresh vehicles at scale” without Chinese tooling, according to a new white paper released by the Center for Automotive Research.

Unfavorable payment structures and pricing standards are kicking American shops when they're down.

10/16/2026

The human element of cybersecurity is undoubtedly the largest, and also the most difficult vulnerability to manage. While most manufacturing leaders have been conscientious about providing training related to proper credential use, email link avoidance and more, people will inevitably make honest mistakes.

Training related to email link avoidance is prevalent, but people still make honest mistakes.

10/15/2026

Is your visual management system merely a decoration or does it tell the truth about what is happening in the operation? Is it a polished version of the truth, or does it reflect reality?

Visual management tools, such as visual management boards, can be “extraordinarily powerful” if used correctly, “but if not used correctly, could actually lead to more distrust and more resistance and bigger walls,” says John Dyer in this episode of Behind the Curtain: Adventures in Continuous Improvement.

Without transparency, visual management is merely decoration.