INTERVIEW WITH LAING INNOTECH

Laing Innotech is a German manufacturer for controllers for DC motors. The controllers are mainly used for linear movements such as height adjustments of tables. The main industry they are operating in is the furniture industry as well as the automation industry. Laing Innotech’s family-run business provides years of experience in the development and production of series of controllers. The high manufacturing depth from hardware to software allows for high-level flexibility.

Interview with Karsten Laing, General Manager at Laing Innotech GmbH + Co. KG.

Easy Engineering: What are the main areas of activity of the company?

Karsten Laing: Our company is operating in the electronics area. We are specialized in the development and production of controllers for height adjustable applications. Laing Controllers are used in the areas furniture and desks, health and comfort, smart home, production and industry in general.

E.E: What’s the news about new products?

K.L: Our latest development is the LMC controller. As opposed to the LTC series where all connected motors run synchronously the LMC series is optimized for applications where the connected motors can move independently or can be assigned to different groups. It is hereby possible to control up to 4 independent movements with a single controller. Another option is to assign a number of motors which should move synchronously to a group and to set the remaining motors to move independently. This could be convenient for back-to-back desks or a desk where monitors should move separately.

E.E: What are the ranges of products?

K.L: Our product range consists of controllers and control panels. Our controller range can be divided in two groups – the Laing Table Controller series (LTC) and the Laing Motor Controller series (LMC). The LTC series is optimized for applications where all motor outputs are operated synchronously – like in table applications – so all connected drives have the same position at all times.

With the LMC series all motor outputs perform independent movements. It is     also possible to define groups of outputs which will be synchronized. This allows for example to move two back-to-back desks with a single controller.

Both controller series are available as mains version (230 V and 115 V), battery version and DC version (10 V to 36 V DC). Optional BLE and Wifi, a highly sensitive collision detection and the possibility of cascading up to 24 drives are some additional features.

Besides the controllers we also manufacture the corresponding control panels which are available in different designs and with different functionalities. Our software tools do not only allow for a simple configuration of the controllers but also for remote maintenance, so time consuming on-site service visits aren’t necessary anymore.

E.E: At what stage is the market where you are currently active?

K.L: We operate in the mature furniture market, mainly office desks. The market is constantly growing as the demand for height-adjustable furniture increases. 

E.E: What can you tell us about market trends?

K.L: One interesting trend in the market is the use of battery controllers to operate desks and other applications independent of a mains connection. This is used on mobile desks and standby desks and other applications where the requirement of a mains connection is not desired. Another trend is hot desking, where different employees share a working space at different times, so the conservative office concept is more and more disappearing. This requires from the controller manufacturers to provide the opportunity to individualize the work space for example by providing customizable smartphone apps where users can adjust any desk automatically to their personal preferences. In general, the trend is to automate more movements like cabinets and drawers.

E.E: What are the most innovative products marketed?

K.L: Our latest collision detection solution Laing GraviSense provides a superior protection by not only sensing when an obstacle is hit, but also sensing the absolute angle of the table top in relation to the center of earth. This solution makes it impossible for a table to fall over even when very soft surfaces are hit.

E.E: What estimations do you have for the rest of 2022?

K.L: We expect to continue our growth that we could achieve throughout the last years and hope to release some new developments by the end of the year.