When GE Healthcare (formerly GE Medical Systems) transferred their MRI table manufacturing program to Bangalore, India, it was a natural fit for Eaton’s India operations. Since 2001, Eaton has partnered with GE Healthcare, supplying the hydraulic systems for its MRI table manufacturing program.

A critical piece of medical equipment, MRI tables must adhere to stringent quality standards and 100% performance reliability. In addition, a processing challenge was created by the 1.5 Tesla magnetic field environment in which MRI tables operate – only non-magnetic materials such as stainless steel, aluminum and brass may be used.

Production commenced in Sept 2001, and Eaton in India and GE have partnered in optimizing the design and upgrading the supply base with CNC machining capability to achieve improved product performance. Subsequently, Eaton has also designed and developed the hydraulics for GE’s Signalite MRI tables for their Japanese customers and is also currently working with GE on the design and development of hydraulics for an advanced DVMR version.

GE is currently Eaton India’s single largest customer with annual sales of US$2.46M, while Eaton India also remains the single source for hydraulics to GE India.