USDATA's Xfactory Takes The Heat Off Danish Stove Manufacturer
Urgent orders define the stove manufacturing market. So, Danish kitchenware manufacturer Voss assembles the stoves it sells by following the Kanban principle, a Japanese production philosophy that has its roots in "just-in-time" manufacturing. While the Kanban philosophy offers flexibility in the manufacturing process, it does not provide an overview of units currently being manufactured.
Voss' factory is based in Federica, Denmark, with its planning department in Lyngby about 200 kilometers away. As Claus Sass Hvass, a Voss IT project manager and engineer, explains, "Previously, we sent data as an Excel spreadsheet from the planning system in Lyngby to the factory in Federica once or twice each day. The delay between planning and production was too large and very expensive."
"Urgent orders often required us to produce a unit not listed on the planning spreadsheet," he continues. "These orders had two rather unpleasant side effects: our inventory wound up in a mess and we had a lot of administrative headaches. Each time we received an urgent order, the planning department had to manually update the original production plan." With Xfactory, a production planning solution from USDATA (Richardson, TX), Voss can now plan the entire production of a unit before it begins and automate changes up until the moment production begins.
Because Xfactory is designed to exchange information among all systems regardless of their physical location, Voss now receives information from the planning system which runs on an AS400 at the same time the production system, USDATA's FactoryLink ECS, collects data. FactoryLink also manages and controls all machines through operating panels placed at each step of the production. These interactive panels assure the system is processing information in real-time as the unit moves through the production cycle.
One of the best features of Voss' new Xfactory implementation is that it took very little time to implement. "Both we and PC System Teknik, our systems integrator, finished ahead of schedule…something that happens very rarely with IT systems," says Hvass. "PC System Teknik had promised a quick implementation, but I was skeptical." In actuality, the entire process from the beginning of analysis to full implementation took less than seven months.
Ease Of Learning New Solution Added To Overall Benefit
Traditionally, new systems can lead to a long learning process as operators are trained to use them. Voss was pleasantly surprised. "In the beginning of the process, I told the employees about the upcoming project," he recalls. "We included their representative in every aspect of planning, which made our transition to Xfactory very easy. Now, everyone knows what is to be produced each day and how far into production we are every minute."
Through Xfactory, each product can be followed through the manufacturing process. Xfactory provides detailed information to ensure that production is running optimally. With its comprehensive reporting capabilities, Xfactory can help track how long it took to produce a unit at each step, what parts it contains, and at what cost the unit was produced.
"We now know exactly where bottlenecks occur in our process," says Hvass. "We have very precise quality data and we know the exact status of our inventory. Before Xfactory, we expected products to be delivered to stock that, for a variety of reasons, never arrived or were incomplete or were not up to our standard of quality. Today, we know if an item will not be delivered and can change the production plans online if we need to. Xfactory has put an end to our running around looking for stoves," Hvass said.
Hvass says Voss is planning to expand Xfactory's reach by incorporating it another department in the factory. "Xfactory is easy enough for me to perform part of the implementation myself," he explains. "When you see how the product works, it's designed it for easy implementation. Because it is imperative to keep production running while you implement Xfactory, it is extremely helpful to be to implement it in small steps. This flexibility makes it possible for me to continually improve our system when needed without adversely impacting production. With this added capability, Xfactory is helping us keep our competitive edge."
Voss' factory is based in Federica, Denmark, with its planning department in Lyngby about 200 kilometers away. As Claus Sass Hvass, a Voss IT project manager and engineer, explains, "Previously, we sent data as an Excel spreadsheet from the planning system in Lyngby to the factory in Federica once or twice each day. The delay between planning and production was too large and very expensive."
"Urgent orders often required us to produce a unit not listed on the planning spreadsheet," he continues. "These orders had two rather unpleasant side effects: our inventory wound up in a mess and we had a lot of administrative headaches. Each time we received an urgent order, the planning department had to manually update the original production plan." With Xfactory, a production planning solution from USDATA (Richardson, TX), Voss can now plan the entire production of a unit before it begins and automate changes up until the moment production begins.
Because Xfactory is designed to exchange information among all systems regardless of their physical location, Voss now receives information from the planning system which runs on an AS400 at the same time the production system, USDATA's FactoryLink ECS, collects data. FactoryLink also manages and controls all machines through operating panels placed at each step of the production. These interactive panels assure the system is processing information in real-time as the unit moves through the production cycle.
One of the best features of Voss' new Xfactory implementation is that it took very little time to implement. "Both we and PC System Teknik, our systems integrator, finished ahead of schedule…something that happens very rarely with IT systems," says Hvass. "PC System Teknik had promised a quick implementation, but I was skeptical." In actuality, the entire process from the beginning of analysis to full implementation took less than seven months.
Ease Of Learning New Solution Added To Overall Benefit
Traditionally, new systems can lead to a long learning process as operators are trained to use them. Voss was pleasantly surprised. "In the beginning of the process, I told the employees about the upcoming project," he recalls. "We included their representative in every aspect of planning, which made our transition to Xfactory very easy. Now, everyone knows what is to be produced each day and how far into production we are every minute."
Through Xfactory, each product can be followed through the manufacturing process. Xfactory provides detailed information to ensure that production is running optimally. With its comprehensive reporting capabilities, Xfactory can help track how long it took to produce a unit at each step, what parts it contains, and at what cost the unit was produced.
"We now know exactly where bottlenecks occur in our process," says Hvass. "We have very precise quality data and we know the exact status of our inventory. Before Xfactory, we expected products to be delivered to stock that, for a variety of reasons, never arrived or were incomplete or were not up to our standard of quality. Today, we know if an item will not be delivered and can change the production plans online if we need to. Xfactory has put an end to our running around looking for stoves," Hvass said.
Hvass says Voss is planning to expand Xfactory's reach by incorporating it another department in the factory. "Xfactory is easy enough for me to perform part of the implementation myself," he explains. "When you see how the product works, it's designed it for easy implementation. Because it is imperative to keep production running while you implement Xfactory, it is extremely helpful to be to implement it in small steps. This flexibility makes it possible for me to continually improve our system when needed without adversely impacting production. With this added capability, Xfactory is helping us keep our competitive edge."