Digital factory doubles productivity

Five years ago, Siemens converted an over 50-year-old factory in Kalwa in Thane that made circuit protection products into a fully digitalised plant. While it previously produced 80 variants on three production lines, the digitalised plant could produce 180 variants on one production line. Each product used to take 21 seconds to make; that came down to 9 seconds. The old factory did 13 quality checks, the new one enabled 52.

Capital expenditure and the space required dropped sharply, output went up substantially, and quality improved dramatically. Sunil Mathur, MD & CEO of Siemens India, says this is the kind of transformation that small and medium enterprises can and must make. “It also opens up the export market for you,” he says.

This is Industry 4.0, where products at the plant communicate with machines, and all processes are IT controlled. Peter Koerte, CTO and strategy officer at Siemens, says digitalised plants double your productivity.