PETpla.net Insider 03 / 2019

DIGITALISATION PET planet Insider Vol. 20 No. 03/19 www.petpla.net 36 Digitalised end-to-end manufacturing execution process provides both efficiency and flexibility A recipe for growth by Gabriele Kosmehl During a one-day event at its EMEA headquarters in Dudelange, Luxembourg, Husky Injection Molding Systems unveiled their Next Generation Operating Model (NGOM) program. This digitalised end-to-end manufacturing solution fulfils the purpose of serving customers with speed and quality through a more efficient and flexible business model. Continuing changes in consumer behaviour, such as the growing demand for customised products, prompted Husky to look for ways in which they could respond quicker and more flexibly to market trends. “People want to differentiate, and to provide that, you must offer a high degree of flexibility throughout your organisation,” explains Wesley Grove, Husky’s Vice President – Operations, NGOM to PETplanet. “The prom- ise of digitalisation is exciting in that new technologies enable connectivity between traditionally siloed functions in a business. Designing processes across these functions, or end-to- end, combined with technologies that connect our people to processes and tools enables us to react to our cus- tomers’ demands in a very fast way and with high quality. We see the abil- ity to deliver fast with great quality and transparency as a very good recipe for growth.” It was back in 2016 when Husky defined the Factory of the Future concept and partnered with the Lux- embourg Government’s Ministry of Economy & Luxinnovation, who made a €3.4 million contribution, to build a proof of concept to bring this new capability and value to life. A solution to the process-flow was developed the following year with Siemens who provided the automation and industrial software. NGOM has been in the vali- dation phase since the first quarter of 2018, accepting orders from pilot lines. “Companies have been working to resolve wasteful processes since the beginning of time. Now digitalisation allows for new, breakthrough solu- tions with unprecedented flexibility in application and potential for scal- ability. What typically was a process redesign that accepted compromises can now be breakthrough approaches that resolve competing contradictions. We will create breakthrough capabil- ity in speed and flexibility at a very high quality that our customers will leverage for their growth. At the end of the day, we are striving to provide solutions with high added value and we believe that speed, quality, and flexibility are values that are great levers for growth that will continue to gain importance in the new economy,” said Grove. Cutting processes from several weeks down to several hours In the short term, a faster delivery with better quality is expected while the midterm goal is a delivery with greater efficiency. With time, digitalisation will fully integrate business process and product, enabling Husky’s customers to bring their product ideas to market with unmatched speed, confidence and design freedom. The NGOM process allows the company to cut hardware ordering and manufacturing from a pro- cess that takes several weeks down to a few hours. Through a web interface, customers can configure their order. Based on this criterion, a solution is calculated within minutes, ready to be produced within the completely auto- mated process in a couple of hours. By evaluating all the generated data, processes and quality can be improved in real time . Husky’s sites in Luxembourg and Canada have been the focus to date. However, according to Grove, the NGOM is a global initiative involving all business units and functions within the company. For this project to succeed changes took place not only in digitisa- tion processes and Industry 4.0 tools, but also and most importantly with team members. In addition to hiring new skill- sets around digitisation, Husky is invest- ing to ensure existing staff are fully pre- Jean Christophe Witz with the first core produced using NGOM Wesley Grove, Vice President – Operations, NGOM, Gabriele Kosmehl, PETplanet and Jean Christophe Witz, Director of Digitization Husky Luxembourg (from left)