Combining operational excellence with the possibilities of Industry 4.0 to become more agile, flexible, and ultimately more efficient. An effective solution to reduce by circa 30% your production time, and maximize your administrative time up to 80%. Choose Industrial 4.0 to increase your potential.
All industries are expected to embrace digital transformation (some have already launched initiatives) in different rates and ways. The future of factories aims to build better systems for operations and operation management.
Industry 4.0 represents the fourth stage of industrial (r)evolution. It is a combination of physical assets and advanced technologies that communicate, analyze, and process data and information.
It is transforming manufacturing and supply chain processes through connectivity and thereby enabling the use of innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and internet of things (IoT) to improve automation, communication and use of real-time data. This enables organizations and customers to be more flexible and responsive and enhances intelligent, data-driven decisions.
By applying these technologies and principles, service, efficiency, quality and safety of industrial processes can all be increased. Companies may create new smart products, services and business models thanks to a real-time supply chain operation.
Industry 4.0 thus unlocks further improvement potentials and expands business opportunities from product-based to service-based revenue streams.
We integrate process, digital and human dynamics to amplify and accelerate tangible progression, while from the start ensuring anchoring and sustainability of achievements.
Industry 4.0 is the solution for you!
The EFESO Consulting team can help you successfully meet the challenges of Industry 4.0 and the large opportunities it brings.
Our Digital solutions are fully integrated and take a holistic view on how to meet the challenge, including the human side of it, one of the most important elements if not the most critical.
Choose EFESO services for :
The starting point for your sustainable Industry 4.0 strategy is a complete and objective view of the opportunities and implementation hurdles existing in your company. We are happy to support you in this analysis and implementation.
As an experienced partner, EFESO Consulting guides your way to exploit the potential of Industry 4.0 and help you become a future-proof company, from both an operational and organizational perspective.
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Smart Factory: making a factory future-proof
In just four weeks, a pharmaceutical & life sciences company wants to plan the main focus for the Smart Factory Transformation of four plants.
Workflows and key performance indicators varied by line and plant, with various digitization needs and priorities. Therefore, at beginning of the project, it was necessary to get a clear picture of the actual maturity and requirements for each location. To this end, the project team developed a scalable approach for lean transformation of the plant.
Challenge
After starting in individual pilot areas of assembly, it transferred the improvements to the current line and finally, with further lessons learned, to the ramp-up of the two new models.
After assessing the digital maturity level of the existing production system, the project team held a joint workshop with the plant management to determine the main directions for each site.
The result was a big picture that ensured a common understanding among the workshop participants as to where the journey should take them. The commitment for the joint next steps was correspondingly high.
Solution
Besides that, the participants also determined the different directions of digitization of the respective locations including topics such as data transfer, advanced analytics, digital twins or autonomous transport systems (AGVs).
So-called “deep dives” were then made to explore the technological and economic details of the defined directions identifying for example areas with high potential for driverless transport systems, the size of the investment needed and the economic benefits.
From this, it was possible to derive very precise statements regarding profitability / pay back of individual business cases.
At the end of the project, the project team for each location arranged approx. 40 key topics and initiatives from the previous weeks into a portfolio with three structure criteria:
Result
Among other things, three key topics were identified, that fulfil three requirements: quickly realizable, low deployment cost and great benefits.
The other focal points from the portfolio were added to the “open items” list in order to implement them later. After a portfolio evaluation of all decision-making instances in the company, the implementation of the following actions was started:
With these digitization initiatives, the company has been optimally equipped for further Smart factory transformation at all locations. Already in the planning phase, it was thus possible to improve the quality of the process and operational excellence at the sites.
Realising true end-to-end digitization for better customer journeys
A global furniture manufacturer was offering a broad variety of different product lines ranging from luxury to discount furniture, each with its own specific sales channels.
In order to reshape this kind of segmentation ROI-EFESO created a unified and integrated ‘end-to-end’ process from the customer request to the delivered product that took into account all relevant stations of Value creation: from the customer experience via ordering to manufacturing and logistics.
Solution
In two workstreams ROI-EFESO took care of the back-end integration and thus everything that happens from the ERP system all the way to the production for one.
For another workstream the project team accelerated the development of the digital channel, starting with the customer experience at the point of sale, working through the ordering process and on to the factory itself.
Result
Parallel front-end and back-end teams ensured that product customization was working flawlessly from the point of sale, through production, to delivery of the product.
The solution created by ROI-EFESO is a highly innovative combination of a 3D visual space and experience and an intelligent configurator. The customer navigates between OLED screens and finds himself in a virtual, photorealistic, 3D animated room. There he is viewing his desired piece of furniture – rendered as a 3D model – from all perspectives.
Furthermore, an ‘intelligent’ configurator is used, comparable to the car configurators used in the automotive industry. During the customer’s ‘try out’ of his virtual product, the salesperson can configure different variants, e.g. the frame of a bed, material or backrests, and visualize them on the screens.
In the future, the salesperson can use several different room settings with plant arrangements, parquet or carpet. Ambient lighting effects, i.e. different lighting scenarios for day and night, will enhance the customer experience. This mix of digital and real world turns the purchase into a “wow factor” experience.
Once the customer has preconfigured his furniture, the order can be placed at the touch of a button. The process for this is automated. Product customization via the configurator at the point of sale naturally modifies the supply chain – more variants result in smaller batches.
Parallel to the developments in the front-end area, ROI-EFESO has therefore combined the ERP systems of the different brands so that the data of all production and logistics processes are now available in real time.
Predictive quality and production through digital process twins
A global automotive supplier was facing two major challenges in its dashboard panel production: on the one hand, risks in the process chain remain undetected due to a lack of transparency and poor supplier management.
On the other hand, the processing of highly sensitive materials means that even the smallest of errors in the production process can lead to the rejection of complete components. ROI-EFESO supported the customer by using a ‘digital twin’ to map the entire production process step by step.
This led to an IoT pilot project that pinpointed potential for improvement and triggers improvements in both production and value stream management at suppliers.
Challenge
As a first step, the project team defined process parameters that could affect both the performance of the plant and the quality result.
The derivation of these parameters was empirically based and included initially more than a hundred different parameters, which were reduced or supplemented in the further course of the analysis.
In the next step, the team verified that the existing process data had been correctly aggregated and processed and gathered data that had not been previously recorded. The team also used additional sensors to capture the new data required for the defined parameters.
Solution
The resulting database was then consolidated and analyzed in a cloud application. On this basis, the project team designed a model that reflects the process of improving the production line for dashboards as precisely as possible – in other words, all relevant parameters, their interactions and critical values.
Like the process itself, this model can go far beyond the company. In the case described, for example, it can be extended to the logistics company that transports the foam, or even to the foam manufacturer.
This is because the reasons behind problems in the foaming process – such as dangerous temperature fluctuations for the sensitive polyurethane – can appear at any point in the value chain.
Result
As a result, the company obtained a digital process map that tracks the entire physical process in real time and enables early intervention according to critical process parameters – a “digital process twin”.
With the help of this ‘digital twin’, the project team was not only able to significantly reduce the plant’s rejection rate, but also to make the correlations of relevant influencing factors on the quality result more transparent. The company also developed a prediction model of the result at the next quality gate.
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