From personal well-being to medical technology – at global player Philips, everything revolves around well-being and health. Founded in the Netherlands in 1881, the company employs more than 73,000 people worldwide, around 300 of whom work in Klagenfurt, Austria. Among other things, one of the five Philips competence and development centers for consumer lifestyle is located here, from which product innovations, for example in the field of hair care or household, emerge. Important components, such as cutting elements for beard and hair clippers or oscillating heads for electronic toothbrushes and replacement toothbrush heads, are also produced in Klagenfurt.
The complex production of these key components depends on the smoothest possible process. “To optimize our production processes, we were looking for an MES that could be operated easily and intuitively. Flexible binding to various machine controls and good support were also important criteria,” says Siegfried Seufzer, Production Manager at Philips Klagenfurt.
That is why the choice fell on a modular and future-proof system from FASTEC. “I successfully introduced FASTEC 4 PRO at my previous employer 10 years ago. I was surprised at how much the MES solution had evolved,” explains Seufzer. His colleagues were also quickly convinced by the system, so Philips was able to give the go-ahead for a joint project. FASTEC started by implementing Machine Data Acquisition with comprehensive reporting and live monitoring of production on five grinding machines and punching presses in the metal processing area. The data acquisition on the lines was realized via OPC and Siemens S7.
Nevertheless, it only took two months from the first workshop to the connection of the MES solution. “The collaboration went very well again this time. FASTEC impressed me once again, especially in terms of the speed of implementation,” emphasizes Seufzer. After a successful test phase, the decision was made to expand the system. “We have currently expanded the system to 25 systems. The aim is to bind all 50 or so lines in Klagenfurt,” says Dennis Gertkämper, Project Manager at FASTEC.
The use of the additional Maintenance and Personnel Time Recording modules has already been prepared as an extension. “The aim is to map the personnel and activity areas of production as well as technology and maintenance uniformly in one software solution and to optimize efficiency without interface losses,” concludes Gertkämper.
