Most production and process engineers in the UK would love to know the detail behind how Beiersdorf (Nivea) and Symrise – one of the world’s largest producers of fragrance, flavours and bulk ingredients – added a substantial amount to their bottom line profitability without any outlay on new machinery. A number of experienced process automation and integration professionals did find out recently, having attended the first of P4A’s Production Intelligence seminars, held at the National Motor Cycle Museum in Birmingham.
Project managers from FELTEN software in Germany flew over to the UK to support P4A with in-depth reports on two case studies, along with preview information on a forthcoming standalone OEE and Downtime MES module soon to be launched in the UK.
Both Beiersdorf and Symrise achieved stunning results by applying Production Intelligence, using Pilot MES modules from FELTEN to reduce downtime incidents and increase production efficiency. The application of Production Intelligence increased process efficiency by 30% with an ROI of under 12 months at one of the sites that was discussed, and is now being rolled out globally.
Attendance numbers were restricted to the invite only event, which saw a mix of high profile end users, process / automation engineers and system integrators speak directly to the original project managers to find out exactly how the results were achieved.
“We were very pleased with how the event went and were even able to accommodate some additional last minute delegates who hadn’t responded to the invites until late on. A detailed presentation was followed by a lively and frank discussion about the merits of Production Intelligence. What was particularly well received was the fact that the Pilot modules, although part of a full MES system could be applied one-at-a-time and could prove themselves by improving different aspects of a production line without needing a huge back-end system or an expensive support package”, commented the event’s organiser Paul Hurst, MD Products 4 Automation.
“The UK is a mature market and so trying to sell an entire MES system will not work for us, apart from the odd occasion where a new plant or production area is being installed for the first time. We are focussing on targeted improvements for existing processing lines, particularly in the food, fragrance and pharmaceutical ingredient production sectors. This is where the PI modules can be very effective solving a range of problems from batching and weighing, downtime monitoring and even converting paper signatory documents the electronic files so they can be included in the overall data capture process”.
For anyone who missed the seminar, the next one is planned for March 2011, if you can’t wait that long, some of the information presented at the conference is available for download at the Products4Automation website www.products4autiomation.com . Visitors should find the information genuinely useful, providing insight and ideas about how to improve process efficiency and remove cost from the bottom line at their own site.
