Running a business is complex work and can be really expensive. But there are ways to minimize expenses while still maximizing productivity and profit.
If you’re looking to cut costs within your manufacturing company, here are 5 different ways smart tech could help you achieve your goals:
Increased Communication Means Fewer Issues
Communication is critical, especially in a production company, as there are quite a few personnel on the average staff, with the manufacturing sector hiring 8.51% of the total workforce in the US. With so many employees, miscommunication on a production floor can cause major disruptions.
A lack of communication results in more waste, a noticeable lack in product quality, slow turn-around rates, and general dissatisfaction from customers. However, enhanced communication means there’s less risk within your workplace, greater potential for productivity, and better engagement between you and your workforce.
Since manufacturing technology allows you to communicate more quickly and efficiently with all departments through immediate, automated notifications, appropriate personnel can address issues faster with the use of smart tech. This optimizes your workflow.
Decreased Downtime Lowers Costs
Downtime can really increase your annual costs. When machines are down, productivity is down, and profits are immediately lost. Planned downtime is something that can be accounted for and included in the budget, but unplanned downtime is the manufacturing company’s biggest enemy.
Downtime is shown to cost production companies as much as $260,000 per hour. When any machines fail, break down, or require an excessive amount of changeover, your business is losing money. With average equipment breakdowns lasting four hours, depending on the size of your company, over $1,000,000 can be lost to downtime.
But with smart tech such as Andon systems—which notify appropriate personnel of issues using a light and notification system—downtime or outages can be resolved immediately and prevented in the future using smart tech analytics. Ultimately, smart manufacturing tech can help you better identify and evaluate causes of downtime and eliminate them, decreasing costs.
Save Money on Untimely Equipment Failure
It’s also important to know how smart tech machinery can give you insight into when upgrades need to be executed. After all, you have a lot of manufacturing equipment within your production company, and planning for equipment upgrades is key to ensure you don’t face major disruptions at key production times.
Taking the time to pinpoint at-risk machines and taking them off the floor for maintenance is made simpler through smart technology such as MES systems, which offer advanced data reports of your systems and production processes. You can make use of slow periods during your financial year to schedule for this kind of maintenance.
This falls under the realm of preventative maintenance, which is hard to conduct when you’re not aided by smart technology. Unpredictable system failures cost money, but with smart manufacturing technology, you can more easily schedule upgrades to avoid costly breakdowns.
Real-Time Data Improves Profitability
If you’re looking to improve your profit margin, as most manufacturing companies are, it’s important to make use of real-time data. Real-time data, as reported by smart manufacturing technology systems, allows you to more quickly and efficiently react to disruptions so you can prevent them in the future.
With the use of real-time data, you can step in at any point during the production process to make necessary adjustments to a project. If you can make a change during the moment when it’s needed most, you won’t have to work retroactively, saving you time and money.
All in all, getting real-time data helps you more accurately develop and achieve your continuous improvement goals. It also helps you set more realistic goals, increasing your company’s profitability. It’s a form of visibility that a manufacturing company needs the most.
Stay on Top of Maintenance
Finally, with all the benefits of smart manufacturing technology, you’ll be able to stay on top of maintenance. Your machines need regularly scheduled maintenance, and the in-depth reports provided by your smart tech will allow you to better predict the best time to perform it. You will be able to foresee needs and reduce costs associated with neglecting maintenance.
In conclusion, smart manufacturing technology offers you the tools you need to cut costs while increasing production efficiency. It’s the kind of tool every manufacturing business needs.