Acoem: Empowering future talent with innovation and knowledge sharing at WorldSkills
The importance of sponsorship
As a leading manufacturing in reliability solutions, Acoem has been a committed supporter of WorldSkills, not only by sponsoring teams but also by providing the latest preventive and predictive maintenance tools for the competition. This year, Acoem is equipping competitors with its latest innovation – the AT-400, an advanced laser shaft alignment tool. The AT-400 offers precision and user-friendly operation, enabling faster and more accurate alignment of rotating machinery.
Not only has Acoem been a major supporter throughout these years, but in 2022, it decided that the best way to give these up-and-coming industrial mechanics a step up in the industry was to expand the way it was contributing to their training. In 2022 and 2024, Acoem Sweden held its WorldSkills Bootcamp – inviting competitors and their coaches to Acoem in Sweden for a week of intensive open training under the guidance of industry experts, including Peter Strömberg, Chief Technology Officer at Acoem Sweden.
The bootcamp garnered considerable positive feedback from participants who came from seven different countries in June 2024. As part of the program, the groups worked together with access to an extensive range of Acoem preventive & corrective maintenance and condition monitoring tools. They received personalised demonstrations and instruction from the professionals who developed the solutions – learning how to accurately record measurements, perform laser alignments, conduct vibration analyses and other related tasks.
Despite not knowing which of the tools they would need to work with at the actual competition, having the opportunity to try a wide variety of technology put these teams in a better position for competing at the WorldSkills Competition a few months later. It also gave individuals a chance to broaden their skills base, network and form important industry relationships.
The 2024 competition format
This year in Lyon, Craig Brazil and Nathalie Drouin have worked together to design the competition’s technical scope, which challenges participants to work with state-of-the-art tools and technology. The predictive maintenance section requires competitors to diagnose and solve real-world problems, such as shaft alignment and vibration measurement, with the most advanced equipment.
Competitors from 12 countries will be judged on their ability to complete tasks that span a wide range of industrial mechanics functions, from welding and machining to assembling and troubleshooting complex machinery. Each task is designed to test not only technical skills but also the problem solving and critical-thinking abilities essential for success in this field.