Mar 14, 2023
About the Customer
Engineering Industries eXcellence’s MOM Discrete and PLM practices have begun an exciting digital transformation initiative for a manufacturer of high-end motorized vehicles across land and sea. Our teams of experts are delivering Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) capabilities and Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) to extend product customization at the market while reducing manufacturing complexity. Starting at the customer’s main production site in Canada, the delivered solutions will next be implemented at their global sites in North America, Latin America and Europe.
- Automotive & Heavy Equipment
- Recreational Motorized Vehicle Manufacturing
- Light Automobile Manufacturing
- Discrete (Piece-Part) Manufacturing
- Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM)
The Customer’s Need
In today’s market, consumers are looking for customized products to suit their unique styles and needs. As a strong believer that progress does not come from standing still, the customer sought technology solutions that could deliver product configurability directly to the market, enabling consumers to customize to their heart’s content. However, delivering this capability would necessitate digital transformation across the customer’s production processes to reduce manufacturing complexity and ensure operational efficiency. So, in addition to their goal of consumer configurability, the customer wanted to maximize the value of the Digital Thread by integrating their PLM and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems to support process improvements and effectively manage manufacturing data across the product lifecycle.
- Deliver product configurability to the market
- Reduce manufacturing complexity
- Manage data across the product lifecycle
- Achieve seamless closed-loop manufacturing
- Maximize the value of the Digital Thread
About the Project
Starting in 2021, our MOM Discrete and PLM practices have worked closely with the customer to address their biggest challenge for delivering configurability to the market – build-to-stock production. This production model involves a build-ahead approach to manufacturing in which production plans are based on sales forecasts and/or historical demand. To deliver customization capabilities to the market, the customer wanted to transition their manufacturing processes to a build-to-order model, in which production plans are linked to specific sales orders. Because this model often increases manufacturing and supply chain complexity, our team of experts implemented integrated, end-to-end, MES, ERP and PLM solutions to handle complexity within the system and simplify manufacturing on the production floor.
The technology solutions we implemented leveraged Siemens Opcenter Execution Discrete, Siemens Teamcenter for Manufacturing, Siemens Active Integration Gateway, Siemens Mendix and SAP ERP integration. Additionally, our Industries eXcellence experts provided Digital Thread consultations for closed-loop manufacturing, supported the logistics of material movements and advised key stakeholders on how to best leverage the new solutions to meet business drivers. As our team continues to implement these solutions across their global sites, the customer can now scale the number of products they bring to the market and offer unlimited product configurations to consumers.
- Industry 4.0 Assessment
- Manufacturing Execution Systems
- Product Configuration Management
- Material & Warehouse Management
- ERP, MES & PLM System Integration
- Global Site Standardization
Engineering’s Expertise
Having worked with this leading automotive manufacturer for many years on multiple global projects, we are proud to represent this customer as their trusted strategic partner for Industry 4.0. The customer chose Engineering Industries eXcellence because of our team’s technical expertise and industry knowledge across different systems to help them achieve business transformation. Not only do we offer an expansive portfolio of solutions and services, but our experts also know how to apply the technology to the customer’s unique manufacturing processes and product sets. As our experts continue working with this customer, we are confident that this digital transformation program will help them disrupt their industry with best-in-class configure-to-order capabilities.
- Strategic digital transformation partner
- Technical MES, PLM and ERP integration expertise
- Global capabilities for multi-site delivery
- End-to-end portfolio of digital solutions and services
- Experience with automotive business and manufacturing processes
