The factory environment is filled with disparate equipment and systems that make it very challenging to respond in real time to disruptions or even prevent issues from arising. Until now, visibility has mainly come from the rearview mirror with reports telling you what went wrong yesterday. This approach leads to maintenance issues, unplanned downtime, lower return on assets, and exposure to higher operational risk. In this session, Aron Semle of PTC described the business opportunity derived from unlocking machine data to provide manufacturing teams with real-time visibility across their various assets, systems, and people. Justin Hester of Hirotec America, a leading global Tier 1 auto supplier with factories worldwide, then presented the phased strategy for operational excellence that his company is rolling out. Today, Hirotec is working to harness the data from the equipment on the shop floor to enable real-time visibility. Tomorrow, analytics will be applied to the aggregated data from Hirotec’s assets and business systems like ERP, to improve root cause analysis and proactive decision making.
