Industrial Automaton
The most recent re-branding of the iconic logo has put the corporation’s greatest success—its R-series units—front and centre as the core of the template.
Industrial Automaton is a leading manufacturer of android chassis and was once among the foremost galactic designers of artificial intelligence. Heavily invested in side projects as much as their own industry, IA is both hedged by these operations as well as exposed to their risk.
During what historians now call the Second Republican Golden Age, about five hundred years prior to the rise of the Galactic Empire, Industrial Automaton were the dominant android manufacturing corporation in the galaxy. They held what was for the bulk of that millennia considered to be a practical monopoly of the industry.
However, their advantage could not survive a number of economic uphevals, which led eventually to severe economic stagnation for the better part of a century during the Crisis of the House of Sevara. The so-called “ruling house” of the Republic had dominated not just the presidency but a large section of the Galactic Senate, and much like Industrial Automaton had controlled and dominated vast swathes of galactic affairs for centuries. Hence, the disastrous depressive inflation which followed the longest period of their ascendancy similarly engineered their fall. So too fell Industrial Automaton, suddenly challenged by new corporations and bit-part side-players such as Cybot Galactica.
Perhaps the most damning symbol of IA’s fall from grace was their attempt to compete with the latter’s burgeoning O-class chassis, particularly the 1PO series of protocol droids which came to dominate the market in the chaos of the Sevara Crisis. The much-vaunted “LOM” series of units were designed to appeal to the vast array of species who found the 1PO units too humanocentric. Yet the design of the O-class, the 1PO in particular, was so radically superior to the LOM series that even after a dozen iterations, Industrial Automaton had barely made up ground between the units. By the time Cybot Galactica released their now-famous 3PO range, the LOM designation had become synonymous with second-rate machine interface.
While still one of the two dominant forces in both artificial intelligence and android manufacture, Industrial Automaton have found themselves relegated to a secondary position behind Cybot Galactica in the development of droid personality, and especially cybernetic enhancements. Some surmise that Industrial Automaton no longer even research cybernetics, and are content to compete in the market via their support of third-party research and development, rather than investing in their own dedicated divisions.
What IA continue to dominate is the mass-production of affordable machine chassis. While their top-model units can no longer compete with Cybot Galactica, their day-to-day labour droids remain the preferred choice among a great number of corporations. Those whose margins cannot afford luxurious high-end units largely turn to Industrial Automaton to fulfil their requirements.
The galaxy’s many hyperlanes continue to be serviced by one of IA’s most reliable creations, the ubiquitous and modest R-series astromech units, whose sheer reliability has seen them largely unchanged for over a millennia of development. In a similar vein, most starports and engineering facilities are crawling with IA’s flagship power-redistribution model, the GNK-series droid, an affordable and reliable—if overly bulky—unit.