As a provider of integrated logistics services in the railway industry, DB Cargo Logistics is responsible for managing the complete transport chain of its customers. To meet the highest customer expectations, DB Cargo Logistics wanted to implement a SCM solution that enables seamless, end-to-end monitoring of rail transports involving various rail carriers. As a leading provider of innovative sorting products, technology, and solutions, Siemens Postal, Parcel & Airport Logistics (SPPAL) proved its AX4 cloud-based logistics platform to keep DB Cargo on track. Siemens AX4 logistics platform brought many layers and levels of operation together for DB Cargo Logistics, including: Mapping train, railcar and container structures Defining schedules rail freightservices Import of real-time tracking data from all logisticspartners Tracking information for their entire rail network The company-wide integration resulted in improved routes for many prominent automotive customers, and more reliable processes and smooth workflows with lower management. Additionally, AX4 is offered as a cloud solution, so there is no need for on-site installation. The Siemens AX4 platform has become a critical tool for the retention of DB Cargo Logistics customers, and a way to help DB Cargo successfully boost daily efficiency, quality, and performance. To find out how you can manage your complete supply and delivery chain with one click, visit http://www.axit.de/en/digitalization for more information.
Read More →Precise Engineering, Quality Construction: How World Class Facilities Get Built
The Austin Company has been serving the manufacturing industry for over 140 years. Today, they continue to provide state-of-the-art facility and equipment design and construction solutions for manufacturers of a wide range of products, including aerospace and automotive, chemical processing, food processing, and laboratory facilities. In advance of our American Manufacturing Summit, we interviewed Matt Eddleman, a Senior Vice President at The Austin Company and asked him the following: How have manufacturing facilities evolved in recent years? What are some notable projects you have worked on over the years with The Austin Company? What was a particularly challenging project you worked on and how did The Austin Company overcome the challenges you were presented with? What do you think is unique about the way The Austin Company operates or approaches a project? What are the main goals you seek to achieve when taking on a project? How do you go about doing this? How do you align site selection and design with a client’s strategic goals? What in-house subject matter expertise does The Austin Company have and how does that help create complex facilities unique to specific industries or products? Click through to read the entire interview.
Read More →Manufacturer Exits Paper Trail – Moves to a Software Path for Better EHS Management
It was really a matter of getting with the times. PACE Industries, a U.S.-based die-casting company, was not unlike many organizations struggling to manage environmental, health and safety (EHS) processes. They were looking to get out of the old world of paper and Excel spreadsheets and into the modern age of intelligent digital reporting. A company with a history dating to the 1970s, PACE was buried under a spreadsheet mountain of incident reporting from 12 divisions and 21 locations throughout the U.S., plus two plants in Mexico. It’s a busy place. You name it, and PACE probably manufactures it, taking aluminum, magnesium and zinc, melting it down, putting it in high-pressure molds, and literally turning it into thousands of parts. Everything from components for the automotive and lighting industries, to barbecue grills, and even guidance chips for missile systems. Suffice to say, paper-based processes simply weren’t cutting it.
Read More →Top 3 Ways IIoT Enables Business Outcomes in Manufacturing
According to IoT solutions company relayr, the manufacturing industry, as a whole, is the least digitally advanced industry today. It is also the industry with the most to gain from the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). With shrinking margins and increasing pressure to deliver better, faster, and cheaper, manufacturers are looking for ways to improve efficiencies, reduce costs, and open up new revenue streams, none of which can be accomplished without embracing the IIoT. The key areas in which the IIoT is poised to help manufacturers achieve their target business outcomes are: Asset Services – the continual monitoring and analysis of production line and/or supply chain data points that are most influential to a manufacturing enterprise. This data can be used to trigger automated responses in the machines, alert employees, track production and inventory in real time, and even enable custom product manufacturing Predictive Maintenance – the ability to conduct “just in time” maintenance, drastically reducing costs related to unplanned downtime as well as unnecessary preventative maintenance visits for healthy equipment. Through advanced analytics and anomaly detection, predictive maintenance capabilities only grow smarter over time through AI capabilities, to continually refine and improve manufacturers’ maintenance performance. Device Management – the functionality delivered by the ability to connect, retrieve data, and take action at the device (equipment) level. This interoperability is only achievable through a solid foundation of an IIoT middleware platform, connected hardware, and a solid device management software component. …
Read More →The Adaptive Machine: Cultivating a ‘green patch’ in your brownfield
Despite the well-documented advantages of digital transformation and smart factories, it can be overwhelming to know where to begin. Cultivating a green patch in your brownfield can be a good way to start. A green patch is bigger than a pilot project, because it is a full-scale production system, but it is a small investment than a greenfield. Typically, the project scope would be one line or cell. We talked with John Kowal, Director of Business Development at B&R Industrial Automation, a global supplier of advanced machine control solutions, about adaptive machines and how to cultivate a green patch within a brown field.
Read More →IoT Enables Predictive Maintenance
Over the past ten years or so there have been many smart manufacturing initiatives that have promoted the need for production facilities to become much more efficient and effective through the use of technology. The concept of the connected factory, achieved through the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), is being implemented, which is significantly driving up operational effectiveness, resource utilization and a digital visibility of production and process metrics never before thought possible.
Read More →How a Safety Management System Can Save You Money
A software-based system for managing safety in manufacturing organizations may hold the key to unlocking efficiency, improving processes and creating safer workplaces that, at the end of the day, puts money back in the pockets of these businesses. Experts say that Safety Management System (SMS) support the ability of manufacturing companies to help change leadership thinking and cultures in reducing the number of workplace injuries through increased awareness of, and involvement in, safety programs, and ultimately elevating the important of and commitment to safety across entire organizations.
Read More →How Robotics Will Drive the American Manufacturing Renaissance: An Interview with Jay Douglass, COO, The Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing Institute
Jay Douglass is COO of The Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute. ARM’s mission is to secure our national interests home and abroad by asserting U.S. leadership in advanced manufacturing, democratizing advanced manufacturing and creating and sustaining valuable, new jobs. Previously Jay worked at the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. His focus was on developing business opportunities for technology development and technology transfer with commercial organizations. He most recently managed the SEI’s business in Europe. Jay has worked with a wide variety of software development and quality technologies. We are thrilled to have Jay join us at the American Manufacturing Summit. In addition to being Chair of our Process Strategy Stream, Jay will host a Lunch and Learn on “Fostering the Growth of National Manufacturing through Novel Robotic Technologies,” and participate in a panel discussing “The Next 10 Years, 3.4 Million Jobs Available: Avoid the Skills Shortage and Attract Top Talent.” “ARM believes that the United States is in the early states of a significant manufacturing renaissance. Our nation’s ability to leverage new technologies, such as robotics, combined with the desire to provide a better quality of life for all Americans, is driving this renaissance.”
Read More →Demand Driven MRP
Demand Driven MRP is recognized as an intuitive proven planning and execution method for today’s complex and volatile supply chains. While CAMELOT Management Consultants‘ services a variety of industries including Life Sciences, Pharmaceuticals, Chemicals, and Industrial Manufacturing, this thought paper focuses on how Consumer Packaged Goods companies specifically can transform their supply chain with DDMRP. Learn more: http://bit.ly/2Dlo0W8
Read More →Five Premium Manufacturing Facilities, from Bakery Production to Heavy Industrial Manufacturing
The Austin Company offers a comprehensive portfolio of in-house services, including planning, architectural design, engineering, design-build, construction management, and construction, as well as site location and operations improvement consulting, for commercial and industrial companies throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. In advance of the American Manufacturing Summit, we asked them to highlight some of their favorite manufacturing facilities they have worked on across different industries, from bakery production to heavy industrial manufacturing.
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