ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 17 -- United States Patent no. 12,311,462, issued on May 27, was assigned to IPG PHOTONICS Corp. (Marlborough, Mass.).
"Laser assisted machining of sheet material" was invented by Leonid C. Lev (Bloomfield, Mich.) and Steffen Mueller (Plymouth, Mich.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A system and process for fabricating components from sheet material. Various embodiments of the disclosure combine punching of components from sheet material with a scoring process that outlines the components prior to the punching operation. In addition, a system and process where the scored portion of the sheet material that includes the scored outline is subjected to a high compression flatt...