The drive to reduce costs and enhance competitiveness in manufacturing industry has led to greatly increased interest in industrial automation, particularly for small and medium sized enterprises. Although manufacturing robots and flexible machining systems (FMS) are no longer the exclusive preserve of the major industrial multi-nationals, their adoption has not been as widespread or as effective as was once predicted. The purpose of this book is to examine the international patterns of development and adoption of flexible automated manufacturing, to identify current and future best practice particularly in the emerging technology of robotic assembly, and to show how technology, industrial flexibility and competitiveness are inter-related. Based on the latest research findings, Joe Tidd provides students of business and management, manufacturing executives, directors and consultants, with descriptions of how automated manufacturing technology will impact on the competitive postion of manufacturing companies in the future, not matter their size or product.