As users know: integration secures competitive advantages
At the SAP Manufacturing Industries Forum, producers confirm the wide-ranging benefits of SAP PLM and the integration solutions of DSC Software.
Karlsruhe, April 22, 2014
The second SAP Manufacturing Industries Forum, April 15/16, 2014 in Chicago/Itasca, Illinois (USA), drew manufacturers from all over the world with a promising motto: “Gain a Competitive Advantage in the 4th Industrial Revolution”. The follow-up event of the former SAP Customer Value Networks broadened the PLM concept into a 360 degree view – with product manufacture constantly in focus. With tried and tested SAP integrations such as Factory Control Center (FCTR), DSC achieved its declared objective: to continue expanding the USA business together with strong partners such as SAP and CENIT.
How internationally well situated the Karlsruhe company already is was again clearly demonstrated at this event. Of the 600 visitors (17 percent more than last last!), nearly 50 percent were DSC customers. Altogether, there were representatives from engineering, IT, manufacturing, and management of completely different industrial branches, including at the joint DSC/CENIT stand. Correspondingly interesting was the bandwidth of questions, which as always were answered immediately and live on the system with a suitable, realistic solution. The visitors agreed unanimously that the solutions shown almost always exceeded their expectations.
Fully integrated PLM system as knowledge database with efficiency bonus
In particular internationally active manufacturing companies emphasized one very positive aspect of the DSC integrations: the fact that new, locally gained knowledge in research and development can easily be shared with all locations – without detours or delays. The reason: the know-how of individuals is available to everyone company-wide in the central PLM system. This helps people to learn from experience and avoid known errors in the future. All this saves work, time, and expense. What is really important, however, is that manufacturers can significantly increase their profit margin of similar products.
Factory Control Center as advantage generator with standardization effect
FCTR users among the visitors reported that merely the use of Factory Control Center had all sorts of advantages. Some of FCTR’s advantages:
• Seamless CAD-CAM process with complete NX-CAM structures in the SAP system
• Workflow-controlled transport of NC data and order data to the machine
• Automatic feedback of optimized NC programs to the SAP system
• Smaller variety of tools and automated construction of tool assemblies
• Higher machine capacity utilization and streamlining of tool stocks
One really crucial advantage of integration is the significant increase in standardization, for example in tooling or machine installation. Furthermore, the increasing product standardization resulting from the use of Engineering Control Center (ECTR) on the development side is a great help to production planning and production – thanks to continuous processes and information flows.
CENIT and DSC – strong SAP partners with solid PLM and CAD competence
The joint presentation of Janicki Industries, CENIT, and DSC was met with enormous enthusiasm. The topic “Rapid Deployment of a Multi-CAD solution for SAP PLM 7” attracted over 40 listeners, and not only because NX and CATIA (which is what it was all about) are the most widely used CAD systems. CENIT and DSC were responsible for the integration of these authoring tools at Janicki. From the DSC side, the SAP PLM Integration for NX was used as well as Engineering Control Center – ECTR – as the integration platform.
One big surprise was that ECTR was presented by SAP in early April at the SAPinsider PLM2014 fair as a technology basis for the new SAP Engineering Control Center integration platform. For the latest news on SAP strategy and the SAP Engineering Control Center integration platform, see our website.