2025 HSS SUMMIT
Session
Beyond Borders: How International Methods Inspire Nontraditional Design Wins
Description:
This session delves into the structural steel fabrication and design differences between the U.S. and international markets, focusing on Japan’s integrated design-for-fabrication approach. Innovations such as teaching-free robotic welding, twin arc advancements, and advanced automation have improved quality, consistency, and efficiency, helping address labor shortages and stringent construction standards while linking engineering closely with manufacturing through technology-driven workflows.
Learning Objectives:
- Understand how nontraditional HSS design techniques – influenced by international methods – can lower costs, shorten schedules, and improve overall project efficiency.
- Analyze case studies from the U.S. warehouse boom to identify strategies transferable to the growing data center market.
- Identify key challenges and solutions in complex HSS connection design, including jumbo sizes, highlighting how automation and advanced tools can streamline fabrication, especially for extensive welding tasks.
- Explore why HSS is suitable for automation as well as the impact robotics and automated welding systems have on fabrication workflows, and ultimately throughput, quality and labor costs.
PDH credits: 0.75
Speakers:
Mr. Yoshihide Inoue, Head of Technical Center, Welding Business, Kobe Steel, Ltd.
Mr. Toyokazu (Tony) Yamaguchi / President & CEO, Yamaguchi Heavy Industries Ltd & American Kattera, LLC
About Mr. Yoshihide Inoue:
Yoshihide Inoue is the Director of the Technical Center in the Welding Business Unit at Kobe Steel, Ltd. He oversees the research and development of welding materials, welding processes, and welding systems worldwide. He is also responsible for R&D projects within the welding business unit. With 32 years of experience at Kobe Steel, he has been engaged in the development of welding systems and welding processes since joining the company. Specifically, he has devoted many years to the development of welding robots and welding power sources. The automation systems he has created have significantly contributed to improving productivity across various industries, including steel structures, shipbuilding, and bridge construction. Among these industries, he has focused on the development of automation systems for the steel structure fabrication, and his innovative systems have become widely adopted, particularly throughout Asia. Currently, he is actively developing groundbreaking automation systems for steel structure work in North America and is fully committed to promoting their adoption.
About Mr. Toyokazu (Tony) Yamaguchi:
Yamaguchi Heavy Industries Ltd. which I manage, is a Japanese steel fabricator founded in 1949. We have many factories certified by the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism and have a track record all over Japan.
The company aims to manufacture “Green Carbon Steel™” using clean and sustainable renewable energy. In addition, in the future, data centers in Japan will require a large amount of electricity, and large-scale construction is planned. Aiming for early commercialization, we will build building information modeling technology and aim to realize smart factories that automate the welding process, an important joining technology, with robots through production innovation. In addition, we have collaborated with steel manufacturers on decarbonized steel structures and have a long track record with green steel technology, such as measuring greenhouse gas emissions during the production process. We will introduce these technologies and our collaboration with Kobelco.
Yamaguchi Heavy Industries established “American Katerra, LLC” in San Antonio, Texas on October 21, 2024 through investment in the United States. We will continue to develop our business while cherishing our vision and discussing the future of independent, productive, and professional work through innovative initiatives and dialogue with young employees. We aim to manufacture and supply steel to all industries in the United States.