In our laboratory, we have been developing a practical demonstration of actuation by means of the Casimir force inspired by the capacitive detection approach originally described by Arnold, Hunklinger and Dransfeld (1972 Rev. Sci. Instrum. 43 584–7). In this paper, we first describe the mathematical challenges pertaining to the electrostatic calibration of our measuring device, which has been enhanced by our recently published results regarding the computation of electrostatic fields in axial systems, such as the long-standing classical circular capacitor problem. We also discuss our computational approach to the calculation of the Casimir force in our system, including our adoption of analytical descriptions of the dielectric functions of semiconductors extended to the case of axial geometries. We will illustrate how the original AHD apparatus has been drastically improved upon, for instance by means of modern nanopositioner technology, and we shall discuss our published experimental results on the dynamics of a vibrating membrane with a central disc, which have provided the first direct verification of the mechanical resonances of such a system. The emphasis of our effort is not exclusively directed to fundamental physics research but is focused on, and ultimately motivated by, our goal of identifying viable industrial applications leading to commercially marketable products based on Casimir force actuation. Therefore we conclude this paper by briefly discussing the contribution we believe these results will offer to some current technological problems, in particular in nanotechnology, including some thoughts on the possibility that dispersion forces may enable a new and rapidly expanding industry to develop in the near future.