Key Takeaway
Many enterprises are pursuing digital transformation to leverage smart manufacturing. Despite this, they often find that digitization processes present unique challenges. An electronic component manufacturer chose MachineUnite to build a series of value-adding processes — such as machine information collection, analysis, and decision support.
Interview with Wang Szu-Hsuan, General Manager of Myshine Technology, Sam Chuo, Business Development Manager at Advantech and Ben Shiue, Product Manager at Advantech
Solution Benefits:
- 10% increase in production utilization rates, which resulted in an average monthly production of NT$1 billion of goods — tens of millions of NTD in monthly revenue.
- According to the traditional integration method, it takes at least three months to realize the acquisition and transfer of machine data. MachineUnite helps reduce this period to one month.
Digital transformation is a growing trend. Indeed, many enterprises are pursuing digital transformation in an effort to leverage smart manufacturing. Despite this, they often find that the equipment digitization processes present unique challenges.
For example, electronic component manufacturers often encounter production bottlenecks on different factory floors, production lines, and equipment. For years, these problems were addressed using walking management models that caused halts in production. Analogously, recent years have seen component shortages in the market with manufacturers often chased by orders. The situation has demonstrated that previous management methods were insufficient in improving production utilization rates. Therefore, the company in this case opted to undertake an equipment digitization project that connected machines to the Internet. This process aided in the development of equipment management and utilization management capacities. With the assistance of Myshine Technology, an SI, the manufacturer in this case chose Advantech’s MachineUnite solution. This solution was used to build a series of value-adding processes quickly — such as machine information collection, analysis, and decision support.
MachineUnite accelerates the construction in IoT
Ben Shiue, product manager at Advantech, pointed out that with the launch of MachineUnite, the manufacturer collects historical data from equipment and work orders, and builds a corresponding digital, closed-loop management mechanism. Factory managers no longer need to wait for staff to compile reports. Instead, they can use MachineUnite visual templates to analyze the operation of individual floors and/or production lines at a glance. Indeed, they could use the same interface to trace the problem points, if they notice an abnormal drop in the utilization rate of a production line. If a machine has a long standby time, the factory manager can change from passive to active, then check who is responsible for handling related work orders and work pieces directly. They can then communicate with the relevant personnel, discover the root cause of abnormal events, and offer suggestions.
In addition, MachineUnite can help users define the alarm configuration — for example, for obstacles requiring quick elimination within a predetermined time — quickly. The system will notify a higher-level supervisor if the time expires before resolution. This serves to reduce standby/down-time and augments production efficiency. Illustratively, the manufacturer in this case saw a 10% increase in production utilization rates when compared to previous measures after using MachineUnite for three months. This improvement resulted in an average monthly production of NT$1 billion of goods — tens of millions of NTD in monthly revenue.
Wang Szu-Hsuan, general manager of Myshine Technology, added that from the perspective of SI, it is clear that the value of smart manufacturing projects is reflected in data analysis at the back-end stage. Despite this, many customers' factories use machines of different make and model, created at different times. This reality means that production equipment and its output formats are often completely different. This means SI must spend time conducting customer interviews and testing when completing machine data capture and transfer. The effort from front-end and back-end is equivalent to 7:3, meaning that lower valuable data collection necessitates massive resource investment.
Using MachineUnite makes accelerating machine networking deployment possible. Taking the case of an electronic component manufacturer as an example, according to the traditional integration method, it takes at least three months to realize the acquisition and transfer of machine data. MachineUnite helps reduce this period to one month. Indeed, the proportion of 7:3 resource investment is augmented to 3:7. This has delivered substantial benefits to operation management.
With the advantages of platformization and low code, it is easy to realize unified management of multiple factories
With the advantages of platformization and low code, it is easy to realize unified management of multiple factories
When defining the benefits of MachineUnite, Sam Chuo, a senior market development manager at Advantech, said that we must start with Advantech’s legacy. Advantech was developing device access long before the term IoT entered common parlance. During this integration, Advantech faced many intractable problems, but formed many OT partners capable of brainstorming corresponding solutions. This created a great ecosystem and multiplied various intelligent edge software that connected diverse machine data to MachineUnite with ease. This was, in turn, connected to the WISE-PaaS industrial IoT cloud platform for analysis.
"Advantech has also made some configurations for the application side that make it convenient for users to meet the needs of point management and equipment management quickly" Sam said. The value of data can be accelerated from the ground to the cloud seamlessly.
Wang Szu-Hsuan added: At this stage, the drivers provided by Advantech WISE-EdgeLink meet 80~90% of the machine access market requirements. This means that SI only need to focus on solving the remaining 10~20% of equipment connection. In addition, this enables users to avoid halts in production when explaining the machine and controller structure to SI, and allows them enter the back-end application development as soon as possible. In sum, it creates a win-win situation between SI and customers.
The manufacturer in this case chose MachineUnite following a visit to Advantech's Linkou Campus, where the company presents intelligent solutions. In addition, MachineUnite leverages platform-based, low-code technology, enabling users to adjust configuration logic flexibly. Following its establishment, optimized configuration can be reproduced as a template, and replicated by other factories with ease. Likewise, a unified platform can be used to manage and control the operational efficiency of multiple factories.
MachineUnite can access and manage industrial machines and help enterprises to achieve intelligent maintenance and upgrade of equipment. It could be applied in smart logistics, smart manufacturing, machine manufacturers and other industries.
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