At a glance
- Manufacturer of special pumps monitors its entire production in real time
- Companies, customers and employees benefit from more transparency and improved processes
- Solution connects local SAP ERP with services in the Azure Cloud
The business situation of our client
Production processes must be as efficient as possible in order for companies to survive in global competition. This was also recognised by one of our industrial customers, a global leader in the manufacture of special pumps. Together, we implemented a monitoring system based on real-time data for its entire production line and achieved a large number of improvements as a result. Because: Up until this point, neither the production status nor the progress of an order could be tracked. The finished goods usually reached the shipping department without notice.
The solution for our client
Our customer’s production process involves pushing the picked individual parts of a pump from one production cell to the next on a transport trolley. In our solution, each trolley receives its own RFID tag, which is linked to the relevant order. The individual manufacturing cells are equipped with corresponding RFID gates. We process the resulting data stream via a real-time route based on services from the Microsoft Azure cloud: An Azure Event Hub receives the data and distributes it further. The data is then analysed in real time via Azure Stream Analytics. We have also connected a local SAP ERP with quality-assured reference data. Only by linking it to the SAP data do the findings from the real-time information gain concrete significance. Finally, the data is visualised via a real-time monitoring dashboard in Power BI.
How data turns into new values
The data-driven real-time monitoring generates new values for our customer on very different levels. The status quo of each individual pump can now be precisely tracked. Likewise, those responsible can obtain an overview of all current orders in real time. As a result, the various production steps can be coordinated much more precisely. For example, the efficiency of the employees in the production cells has increased significantly, as they are now informed about upcoming orders at an early stage. And of course, the company’s customers are also much more satisfied: they receive much more precise information about the status and delivery date of their goods.
turn your data into value.
