Representatives of the major international company Caterpillar visited the Technical University of Košice on 19 April 2023. In the premises of UVP TECHNICOM, the Rector of TUKE, prof. Stanislav Kmet', welcomed the delegation consisting of Marek Uhrin (Managing Director, Caterpillar Slovakia), Ted Pauly (Engineering Director, CAT Digital), James Stephens (Engineering Director, CAT Digital), Brian Blomer (Engineering Director, CAT Digital), Akash Jain (Head of CAT Digital India), Josh Loy (HR Manager, CAT Digital), Christina Lycke (Marketing & Communications Manager, CAT Digital), Carly Irlbeck (Talent Acquisition Manager, CAT), Wyatt Page (Lead Engineer, CAT Digital), Spencer Cree (Lead Engineer, CAT Digital), Rajesh Thevar (Engineering Manager, CAT Digital) and Mike Caskey (Engineering Manager, CAT Digital). The Rector briefly introduced our university and its faculties and prof. Ivo Petráš (FBERG), doc. Ján Kráľ (SjF) and doc. František Babič (FEI) also contributed to the topics discussed.

The company´s focus is related to three faculties – FBERG, FEI and SjF and so the tours of the laboratories, that interested Caterpillar and its representatives the most, followed:

1. Industrial Control Systems Laboratory – prof. Ivo Petráš
2. Smart Industry Lab Industry 4.0 lab – doc. Peter Papcun
3. Prototype and Innovation Centre – doc. Ján Kráľ
4. Laboratory of Automation, Mechatronics and Robotics – doc. Ján Kráľ
5. OpenLab – prof. Jaroslav Porubän

The aim of the meeting was to establish the first contact between TUKE and Caterpillar. Another meeting will be held in the next few days, this time on specific topics such as “study programmes, trainees, graduates, etc.” We believe that the first meeting was meaningful, and we will establish a good cooperation.