While the world is becoming more equal in terms of gender equality in the workplace,  in many professions it’s still very one-sided in terms of representation.

One such profession is engineering. Studies show that currently only 13 percent of engineers are women. Thankfully, many companies are working to change that, including the ARaymond Network, which manufactures assembly and fastening systems worldwide and has more than 7,000 employees.

Mareike Pollichino is an engineer who works for ARaymond in Germany as a parts designer and development engineerfor metal fasteners used in the automotive industry. She has been with the company for more than 12 years.

Pollichino says her decision to pursuing this automotive engineering as a career was a delayed decision, because initially she viewed working in the automotive field as a male profession.

“I was always curious about how things worked and was interested in the subject. But I decided very late that I wanted a technical profession in automotive. Prior to that, I had thought of other roles like media design and graphic design being for women, and automotive for men,” Pollichino said. “Thankfully my family motivated me to pursue this, including my brother who is an engineer. Through encouragement from my internship in ARaymond, I was positively surprised how open the company was to me as a young woman. After my internship, I wanted to continue my career in this field.”

When one thinks of the agricultural industry, plastic waste is not the first thing that comes to mind. But the reality is that plastics play key roles in the farming and greenhouse business — and leave behind much waste every year.

As an example, just in the United States, the agricultural plastics generation is estimated to be 816 million pounds. And most of that is not recycled, ending up in the ground or landfills, often impacting wildlife and the environment negatively.

A positive trend, though, is the move toward more eco-friendly, biodegradable products — which are fully compostable and will leave behind no waste.

The 5G Automotive Association (5GAA) hosted a virtual showcase to underline the strong momentum around recent deployments of Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything (C-V2X) technology in the United States. Members Audi and Applied Information announced a new joint initial C-V2X deployment in Alpharetta, Georgia, sealed by a memorandum of understanding.

C-V2X, which allows vehicles to “talk” with other vehicles and the infrastructure on the roadways, is an essential enabler for a safer and more efficient transportation system. Combining both low-latency direct communications in the 5.9 GHz ITS spectrum band (not requiring network coverage) and mobile network communications, C-V2X deployment is now a reality in multiple locations across the United States. “C-V2X is the vehicle communication technology most capable of making America’s roads safer, smarter and more efficient,” said John Kwant, Global Director, Government Relations, Mobility and Advanced Technologies, Ford Motor Company. “Its performance, evolution, and deployment advantages are critically important to the future of mobility and will result in numerous safety benefits for American drivers.”