Reading time 2 Minuten

Sustainable Production as a Success Factor

Tougher competitive conditions are shaping the market: supply bottlenecks, cost pressure and the increasing importance of sustainability in production are shaping market conditions. This is confirmed time and again in discussions with customers and interested parties.

We know the challenges faced by many companies and various industries from our daily experience. Efficient use of resources is essential nowadays. Digitalization can make a major contribution to increasing material efficiency – both directly during production, during packaging or simply through paperless production.

Many customers wished they had taken the path to digital production years ago.

In individual sectors such as plastics, metal processing or the chemical and electrical industries, the savings potential was already estimated to be between five and eleven billion euros per year a few years ago (Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy*) – unfortunately, this will not be much better today. According to a study* published in 2019, the food industry generates 2.2 million tons of waste per year from food processing in Germany alone. In times of Fridays for Future, constant global warming and the *Agenda 2030, this is too much and must be improved.

With rising prices and the finite availability of raw materials, waste avoidance is increasingly becoming a key issue for our customers – and for industry in general.

Step by Step to Digital, Sustainable Production

Where does production come to a standstill? How can processes be made more efficient, the material flow improved and waste reduced? Unfortunately, many companies do not recognize the potential for optimization in their production. Manual data acquisition is error-prone, incomplete and non-transparent – so troubleshooting is like finding a needle in a haystack.

It is easier to digitalize production step by step on the way to the smart factory and thus gradually increase the OEE. When I explain this approach to interested parties, I often encounter a lack of understanding at first. High investment costs and difficulties in connecting machines are common arguments. I don’t find it difficult to refute these.

Some of our customers achieve a return on investment in less than 12 months. The resource savings achieved are good for the company, society and the environment. And of course we can bind machines with AND without digital machine control.

Reports Possible Far Beyond Resource Efficiency

Once implemented, an MES provides all the necessary facts for process optimization. MESs record PDA/MDA data and visualize it in real-time. Sources of error in the production process and the need for action can thus be identified at an early stage. Production management can take targeted countermeasures and completely avoid or significantly reduce rejects.

As the machine data is continuously recorded in terms of quantity and quality produced, quality management has transparent data that contributes to compliance with defined quantity and quality parameters and thus reduces material waste.

Based on my experience, I can say that there is potential for optimization in every company once the causes of waste have been identified.

Digitalized production can make a major contribution to increasing material efficiency and thus to more sustainable production. Our modular MES software solution FASTEC 4 PRO is the right tool for this. 

Author: Lars Knitter

Sales and Marketing Director
Consulting for interested parties and customers as well as support for national and international digitization projects with experience since 2013.

Also interesting:

Dashboards, OEE, Produktion, Industrie 4.0, digitale Fertigung, Overall Equipment Effectiveness
Dashboards for Reporting on Production Processes

Test phase of new products successfully completed

Everything at a glance: We have developed several detailed standard dashboards for pvaPRO and smartOEE for a clear report of production processes.

Chapter

FASTedge SFT15

The 15-inch touch terminal is required for each machine. It has a universal RFID reader and two digital inputs for machine connection as standard.

Terminal, Shopfloor, Tablet, Produktion, FASTedge, MES, MES-Einstieg, FASTEC

FASTedge Box

Both the terminals and the machines are connected to the EdgeBox via LAN or WiFi. The cloud connection is made via your network or mobile communications. At least one EdgeBox is required. The system can later be moved to your own server.

Edgebox, MES-Einstieg, MES, Edge, Hardware, FASTEC, FASTedge

User

Personal users are required to report the collected data. The number of employees involved in data acquisition in your production does not matter.

Systems

Each line and machine in your production is licensed individually.

Thank You for Your Interest in FASTEC

Please confirm your data for the free download. After filling out this form, you can directly download our User Reports and Whitepapers.

  • This field is hidden when viewing the form
  • This field is hidden when viewing the form
  • * = Required Field
  • This field is hidden when viewing the form
  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.