Cutting Through The Complexity

One factor, however, promises to influence the design of these machines for the foreseeable future: The lack of skilled operators to run them.

"I haven't yet spoken to a single plant manager who hasn't said it's hard to find skilled help," says David Spiel, vice president of Spiel Associates. "The only improvement to cutting machines would be to put better computers on them. There reaches a point where the actual mechanics can't be improved much further."