The key to any successful business is data. Data helps you to understand where you are at, why you are there, and what you need to do to get to where you want. Without an effective form of data collection and analysis, you won't be able to identify trends, make informed decisions, or accurately predict future outcomes. This lack of insight could leave your business stagnant and missing out on opportunities for growth and improvement.
This is why data analysis is so important, particularly within the manufacturing industry. With so many moving parts, processes and problems, it would be impossible to keep track of everything manually. Software will enable you to collect real-time data, identify trends and resolve problems seamlessly, all while your team can focus on things that will move the needle. This blog will dive into all the amazing benefits of investing in manufacturing analytics software, and will provide a case study to show the real life benefits of analytics software.
Uncovering Hidden Efficiencies
One of the ways in which manufacturing analytics softwares are so beneficial is that they identify areas where production processes can be made more efficient. By sifting through vast amounts of data, the system uncovers patterns and trends that might go unnoticed, such as pinpointing where resources could be better used or operations streamlined. This process not only leads to cost reductions but also improves production rates without the need for further investments. Companies leveraging this aspect of analytics find they can do more with less, boosting their competitiveness without additional capital expenditure.
Elevating Product Quality
Another area in which analytics software excel is in quality control. It instantly identifies anomalies or deviations from the norm that could signal a decrease in product quality, enabling quick corrective action. This capability ensures that products consistently meet or exceed customer expectations, significantly reducing the costs and reputational damage associated with defects and returns. Companies using analytics in this way also benefit from a stronger market position due to higher customer satisfaction and lower operational costs. Our manufacturing analytics software, Busroot, measures quality through the OEE metric. It provides you with a % score for how you are doing, and offers key areas that you can improve.
Optimising Supply Chain Management
Manufacturing analytics software can also offer clarity and foresight when it comes to supply chain management. By analysing data across the supply chain, it provides predictive insights on inventory requirements, highlights inefficiencies, and suggests actionable improvements. It will be able to pick up on trends, such as certain parts/materials that are consistently late, and you can use this insight to put in place actions that will mitigate this issue, such as ordering parts earlier than necessary.
These valuable insights optimise the flow of materials, ensuring timely delivery to production lines and, ultimately, to customers. The result is a more efficient supply chain with reduced lead times and higher levels of customer satisfaction, making the business more responsive and agile in meeting market demands.
Enhancing Energy Efficiency
Energy consumption is a significant cost for manufacturers. Analytics software can significantly improve this by monitoring energy use throughout various operations, identifying inefficiencies, and recommending adjustments. These adjustments can lead to substantial reductions in energy usage, which not only lower operational costs, but contribute to environmental sustainability. Companies implementing these recommendations often see a dual benefit: they reduce their carbon footprint while also achieving savings that can be redirected towards innovation or expansion. Busroot is able to seamlessly analyse your energy usage and offer innovative tips to reduce your consumption.
Want to learn more about how Busroot can reduce your energy consumption? Come and attend our webinar where we will show you exactly how much latent energy usage could be costing your business. The webinar will be in July with dates TBC, but register your interest at https://www.output.industries/smdh-lighthouse
Reducing Downtime
Unplanned downtime is a major expense for manufacturers, leading to lost productivity and increased costs. Manufacturing analytics software combats this through predictive maintenance, analysing data from equipment to forecast potential failures before they occur. This allows for maintenance or replacement at the most opportune times, keeping production lines moving and reducing costly interruptions. Manufacturers adopting predictive maintenance strategies find they can significantly reduce downtime and improve operational reliability and efficiency.
Boosting Employee Productivity
By providing clear insights into inefficient practices and pinpointing areas for improvement, manufacturing analytics empowers employees to enhance their productivity. It identifies areas where human error may frequently be the cause of downtime, and as such helps to highlight where management may need to focus their training efforts. This therefore closes skills gaps and improves overall workforce performance. This not only boosts individual productivity but also enhances team cohesion and operational efficiency, contributing to a more motivated and effective workforce.
Driving Strategic Decisions
Beyond the immediate operational benefits, manufacturing analytics software offers strategic advantages by providing a comprehensive view of business operations to executives. The best way to get buy-in from executives is with data. For example, Busroot can look at your historical data and identify machines that are continuously breaking down and causing excessive downtime. You can use this insight to go to your executives and ask for funding to upgrade the machines. Similarly, Busroot can highlight certain materials that are constantly causing quality issues, and you can use this to request that new materials are sourced.
This data-driven perspective can support informed decision-making on a variety of key business aspects, from capacity expansion, to market entry of new products and energy optimisation.
Enhancing Regulatory Compliance
For industries where compliance is extremely strict, such as the pharmaceutical or automotive industry, manufacturing analytics can help to ensure businesses remain compliant. It automates the monitoring of production processes to ensure they meet industry standards and regulations, helping avoid costly penalties and maintain trust. For instance, the food and beverage industry has very strict requirements for certain environmental conditions. The software can continuously monitor these within the production facility, such as temperature, humidity, and cleanliness levels, ensuring they remain within specified limits to prevent microbial growth or cross-contamination between products.
Similarly, manufacturing analytics provide detailed documentation and traceability of compliance efforts, an essential feature during audits or inspections. This data-driven evidence of compliance not only streamlines the audit process but also bolsters a company's reputation in the eyes of regulators, partners, and customers alike.
Promoting Continuous Improvement
And last but certainly not least, manufacturing analytics help to instill a culture of continuous improvement. By identifying areas for enhancement and tracking the impact of changes, you are ensuring that you are always implementing positive changes and improving as a company. This approach ensures that companies remain agile, and can adapting swiftly to market and technological shifts. By fostering a mindset of perpetual optimisation, businesses can maintain a competitive edge, continuously refining their operations to meet evolving challenges and opportunities.
Case Study
It's all well and good talking about the many benefits of manufacturing analytics, but how do this manifest in reality? A1 Bacon implemented Busroot, our manufacturing analytics software, and they were over the moon with their progress. A1 Bacon is a food and beverage company that produce mouth-watering and premium quality bacon products, with a remarkable daily output of more than 40 tons. They were struggling with the following issues:
- Reliant on manual data collection
- Little understanding of their progress towards KPIs
- Legacy machines that were not able to communicate progress and would require expensive retrofit
- Lack of dedicated in-house digital team
The A1 Bacon team implemented Busroot in order to visualise their production and better track their KPIs. The implementation gave the operations leadership team the true picture of production progress in real time. Busroot has transformed the culture at A1 Bacon, taking them from an organisation with little to no technology within the production process, to a robust solution that has quickly become integral to the day-to-day operations.
As such, within the first 60 days they were able to increase their production output by 14%! This brought about cost savings that meant they had already gained back the cost of their annual subscription. Another benefit included being able to significantly reduce costs on their packaging waste and idle time.
Want to see these amazing benefits for yourself? Get in touch now and we can schedule a demo so you can see the true power of Busroot!
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