Software Management

Manufacturing Software

Connecting software and people

Manufacturers’ Monthly speaks with Mike Russell, managing director of Central Innovation, about how manufacturing businesses of all sizes are integrating data to save time and grow profits.

CENTRAL Innovation has provided solutions for the Australian and New Zealand manufacturing industry for over 30 years.

Despite offering a range of software products and support, our people have been key to driving the company’s success over three decades, according to Mike Russell, managing director.

“Within organisations, typically the underestimation is in the implementation phase,” he says. “Having the right experience to deploy the technology is often half the story.”

More than 100 Central Innovation staff across Australia and New Zealand provide technical support, training, and innovative products to thousands of big and small-tomedium enterprises.

“We are seeing key people leaving businesses, moving jobs because of the skills shortages in Australia caused by border closures,” he said. “We’ve kept our team together and growing because we focus on the customers’ workflow and we don’t take shortcuts. The solutions we provide are built to provide resilience and robustness. Anyone can promise to provide service, but you need the trained-people to deliver upon such a promise and not just the software.”

As well as some of the biggest manufacturing businesses in Australia, Central Innovation works with innovative, developing companies, providing solutions in which start-ups rely on.

“A lot of the initiatives customers have been taking over the past 24 months have been supported by the architects, engineers and designers who are either trained by our people or we provide assistance with the software that they’re using which we’ve supplied.”

Integration solutions

Central Innovation’s flagship solution, DataSuite, helps computeraided design data (CAD) flow seamlessly to production systems.

The software was developed by Central Innovation in Australia to enable businesses in the manufacturing industry to introduce a single process to their data management, using a common language to transform and merge data between systems, automate the business rules of the company.

“One example can be seen when we implement DataSuite for large or small companies to help them integrate the data that they’re putting in their design models across to their ERP systems to do things like create a bill of materials, for example,” Russell said.

“A lot of the software that companies buy is disparate. So, we integrate the business rules, the data from one point to another and the normalisation of all of those things.”

Moving data from one system to another can be a complicated, often manual task that is slow and exposed to human error. DataSuite automates the grunt work, but at its most complex can host a production workbench with business rules that check for the correct drawing numbers, part numbers, specifications, and standards.

“The customer can change these parameters so they’re not spending a fortune every time they want to change something,” Russell said.

Around seventy per cent of Australian manufacturing businesses operate without integrated systems, a trend Russell says is changing because of the supply chain and business resilience challenges that the Pandemic has again highlighted.

“A lot of companies have signed on to implement DataSuite because they are wanting to get the data that’s locked up in the design files available to other systems, processes and workflows within their business,” he said.

“People sometimes fail to recognise an integration problem. If you’re re-keying data, you’re making mistakes. In just about all cases, we do a statement of work which describes the workflow with the customer, the systems that they’re using to support that workflow, and the problems that they’re encountering, and the capabilities they would like to develop.”

The solution to solve common problems for manufacturers isn’t a quick fix. Russell has seen SMEs suffer from trying to manage with software downloaded from the internet on their own – and says the impact of staff turnover is often underestimated when manufacturing businesses use DIY integration.

“With DIY, you have to have the expertise in house,” he said. “And we’ve seen what happens when DIY goes does not provide a sustainable, support solution. Particularly during the last couple of years with supply chain challenges and enormous amount of staff turnover. A lot of the experience and knowledge leaves the business when the people leave and so they end up swapping systems if favour of what their newcomers recommend – this can have mixed results. The point is that the systems that they’ve cobbled can’t run themselves once the local expert leaves the business. So, we are sometimes asked to help solve problems and help deliver capabilities.”

Using DataSuite has saved Technopak more than 1,500 hours of manual work.

Technopak success story

DataSuite has recently helped one of the world’s leading designer and developer of hygienic bulk packaging and powder handling systems eliminate data transfer errors and speed up delivery.

Technopak’s packing lines are currently composed of several thousand individual parts and many assemblies, designing everything in house with local and international companies to manufacture the parts.

However, the growing complexity of its SOLIDWORKS assemblies, along with changes in the data structure of its product data management (PDM) vault meant that Technopak was finding it increasingly

ManufacturingSoftware

Mike Russell, managing director of Central Innovation.

difficult to export an accurate clean mechanical bill of materials (BOM) to its custom-built ERP.

Luke Holmes, Technopak’s GM and operations manager, says attempts to overcome this data misalignment resulted in extensive manual rekeying of data and the need to constantly double and triple-check the information within the BOM.

“We had attempted to automate the process to save time, but we found instead that we were having to check every single line of data because we simply couldn’t trust its accuracy,” he recalls. “Outdated information was being extracted, leading to downtime and work duplication, all of which was becoming increasingly timeconsuming and costly.”

The solution was to employ Central Innovation’s DataSuite software to deliver seamless data transfer between the PDM and ERP systems while eliminating the output inconsistences.

Luke estimates that using DataSuite to integrate Technopak’s custom ERP system with SOLIDWORKS PDM has saved the business more than 1,500 hours of manual work over the course of a year.

“We no longer have Procurement checking each and every line on the BOM once it’s released by Engineering, saving us considerable time,” he adds. “And by removing this checking step, we’re also getting fewer double-ups and manual problems, which means we’re also saving the cost of procuring parts which turn out to be incorrect.”

The reduced occurrence of missing items in the assembly kits has also reduced downtime in the Workshop, and ensured a smoother workflow from Stores to Manufacturing.

“All these improvements mean we’re now saving a considerable amount of time and money, with a much-improved workflow,” Holmes said.

Solutions for big and small

Mike Russell notes that SMEs often have big company problems on small company budgets. This disparity can lead to the search for an easy solution in the age of the pervasive internet, which can actually lead to more problems for businesses.

“The problem with people expecting a Google answer to complex or even basic workflows is a lack of forward thinking,” he said. “We are happy to work with just about any brand of software, but I need to be convinced a business has the right people to implement the system and handle change management. This is very important because people are more mobile than companies. If all the expertise is tied up with one person who might leave half-way through implementation then you can experience problems.”

Central Innovation’s experience is allowing businesses to properly delegate tasks, not wasting engineer’s value on time-consuming assignments.

“This is what we do to improve business outcomes,” Russell added. “Whatever design system, whether it’s cloud based or whether it’s desktop based, we can accommodate requirements. Flexibility and resilience are essential.”

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