Phases of a consultancy
The technical consultancy is aimed at mapping the current state of our clients’ operations, detecting the points for improvement and optimisation that can be addressed by digitalisation and drawing up a digital transformation roadmap that is consistent with the factory situation and the digitalisation and automation standards set by ISA-95.
The Analysis phase corresponds to the field work of the consultancy and is carried out 100% on the client’s premises.
During the different visits, the following work will be carried out:
- AS-IS: Analysis of the initial situation.
- Analysis of strategic plans to ensure alignment of guidelines.
- Visit to the facilities to learn about the processes, operations and level of technological maturity.
- Detailed analysis of processes and tools.
- Identification of needs and opportunities for improvement.
In order to carry out the analysis, it will be necessary to involve the interlocutors identified by the client and their availability to provide the required documentation, to hold information gathering meetings and to participate in workshops.
The Definition phase corresponds to the technical office work, which is carried out by the team of consultants at Geprom’s premises.
During this phase, several short remote meetings with the team defined so far may be required to resolve doubts or clarify premises.
The work carried out is as follows:
- Map of processes and improvement points
- Definition of the AS-IS
- Technology map TO BE
- Relationship (dependence / precedence) with other projects
- RoadMap – roadmap, coherent projection over time for the achievement of the identified improvements.
The Closing phase corresponds to the meeting to finalise the consultancy and is carried out in a face-to-face or remote format, depending on the client’s requirements.
The items discussed at this meeting are as follows:
- Presentation of the results and conclusions to the team designated by the client.
- Delivery of the final documentation.
- Process map with opportunities for improvement (AS IS – TO BE)
- Technology Map and Road Map
- Definition of the next steps in case you want to start progressing along the different lines.
The first thing to do is to define the degree of maturity of the factory. That is to say, to evaluate both technically and operationally, the state of the machines, of the processes and of the organisation and strategy followed by the company. We also evaluate not only the infrastructures but also the use of these infrastructures and the extent to which the existing technologies are being put to good use. In this way, we are aware of whether there is a good use of the machines or, on the contrary, production can be made more efficient and better results can be achieved.
It is at this stage that a roadmap is established. The roadmap is the design in the form of a conclusion of concrete actions and steps to be taken.
What we obtain is an exhaustive analysis where we can see the critical points of the production processes, which can lead to errors, incidents or simply slower production than it should be. In addition to this, the results are also analysed, looking at the products that fail or are declared as “bad” to see what causes the errors. In this way, we can also look for a solution to reduce the margin of failure in the final product.
The next step, once the strategy is clear, is the deployment of the solutions that will take the factory towards the Smart Factory. New innovative technologies will be incorporated to serve as tools to provide valuable data, to obtain a global and detailed view of everything that happens in the plant in real time, and to facilitate decision-making by operators. We will obtain not only high product traceability, but also a constant real-time analysis of the status of our machines and ongoing operations. This will help to optimise production and make production processes more efficient.
However, industrial consultancy does not end here. After this first deployment, it is key to evaluate the results obtained and to see what has worked and what can be further improved. Also, there may be new priorities or details that need to be taken into account. This is why these models are defined as evolutionary or scalable, as they, like your production, may require changes due to, for example, the growth of your factory, new interests in production, new products, etc.
Finally, all steps are integrated into this one. It is analysed which system the company requires in order to define an optimal and complete integration architecture as an MES system. This will be the basis for the digitisation of information flows and for advanced analysis of the data obtained for troubleshooting on the shop floor.
