Sixty Years of EDM

GF AgieCharmilles hosted its International Technology Show at its main building in Losone, near Locarno on Lake Maggiore in Switzerland
 

Featured Content

Add Flexibility and Speed to Your Operation with Next-Generation Robotics by Okuma READ MORE

Factory Orchestration System Adds Clarity, Accountability and Accuracy to Shop Floor READ MORE

Exploring Automation at IMTS 2026 READ MORE

EDM (electrical discharge machining) got its start in 1952 when the Russian scientists, Boris and Natalya Lazarenko, first used electrical energy emitted by an energized electrode to remove metal in a controllable fashion. Two years later, a Swiss company introduced the earliest commercial machine tool using this metal removal process. Six decades later, GF AgieCharmilles (today’s corporate entity rooted in the original Swiss company) is still building die sinking, wire and hole-drilling EDM machines in Switzerland.

In addition to EDM, GF AgieCharmilles provides high-speed/high-efficiency milling and laser texturing technologies, as well as related customer services and support for these technologies. This range of technology is important, because the current state of EDM is best understood in a context where these technology components are combined in an automated, integrated manufacturing solution.

GF AgieCharmilles’ recent International Technology Show in Losone, Switzerland, commemorated the 60-year history and evolution of EDM, from its inception to its culmination as the critical process in advanced mold, die, toolmaking and high precision production. View this slide show to see what this event was all about.