Articles
Building a Secure Manufacturing Infrastructure
June 17, 2013 9:51 am | by Grant McDonald, Product Marketing Manager for Symantec SMB & .cloud | CommentsThe digital design process makes it easier than ever for employees to share information with one another and outside experts, but at the same time, with every endpoint connected to the Internet is a risk of a cybercriminal stealing this intellectual property or other sensitive information.
Where Has All The Training Gone?
June 17, 2013 9:45 am | by Robert Allen and Kathleen Bellemare, Connecticut Spring & Stamping | CommentsTraining is extremely important to the future of manufacturing in the United States, yet in many states, it has fallen by the wayside. Training for skilled manufacturing positions has been hit by a perfect storm of budget cuts and the mistaken idea that all young workers should go to college.
5 Quick Questions: Siemens’ Helmuth Ludwig
June 13, 2013 2:20 pm | by Jeff Reinke, Editorial Director | CommentsAlthough the company operates a diverse collection of business units in 190 countries, German-based Siemens also employs more than 60,000 people in 130 U.S. manufacturing facilities. So with this in mind, we recently sat down with Helmuth Ludwig, the CEO of Siemens’ Industry Sector in North America.
Waste Can Become Business
June 13, 2013 1:54 pm | by Suley Muratoglu, vice president, Marketing & Product Management, Tetra Pak Inc. | CommentsThere’s a kernel of wisdom in that old parental admonition: clean your dinner plate because there are children starving in Africa. By 2050, we’ll need to increase world food production by about 70 percent to feed an estimated 9 billion people, according to a recent report by the Food and Agriculture Organization.
Understanding the Options in Manufacturing eCommerce
June 13, 2013 12:39 pm | by Bob Barr, Senior Vice President, Acquity Group | CommentseCommerce is driving new opportunities in manufacturing and other B2B industries. With the right technology, a manufacturing brand can dramatically improve its online presence, from a basic website to a sophisticated digital resource capable of promoting products, completing orders and performing other functions.
Measuring the Impact: Quality Metrics & Manufacturing Intelligence
June 13, 2013 9:36 am | by Steve Wise, VP of Statistical Methods, InfinityQS Intl. | CommentsWhat if you could report to your board room that reducing scrap has increased your company’s profit by 10 percent? Or, what if you could show plant managers that exactly 15 defects occurred within a particular shift? Because quality affects every level of an organization it is far more than a cost of doing business.
Keeping It Fresh
June 12, 2013 9:49 am | by Krystal Gabert, Editor | CommentsThrough a unique partnership only possible in the Netherlands, Hoogesteger juice company and Wageningen University have partnered to create and implement a process by which unpasteurized juice is treated with high voltage pulses, extending shelf life by two weeks.
Innovative Bottle Packing Equipment Makes 'Going Green' a Snap
June 11, 2013 12:18 pm | by Mario J. Mazzotta, Customer Service Manager for Field Engineering, Standard-Knapp | CommentsUsing less material in the typical PET bottle has definitely had a positive impact on sustainability for beverage processors. The strategy, called lightweighting, reduces bottle weight as much as possible. For example, many water bottles used to use about 18 grams of plastic, and now use about 12 grams.
The Everyday Usefulness of the Problem Statement
June 11, 2013 9:28 am | by Alan Nicol, Executive Member, AlanNicolSolutions | CommentsLast week I wrote about how our continuous improvement and process improvement tools and methods can be used any time and discussed the Parameter Diagram or P-diagram as an example. Let’s continue that thread and look at the ubiquitous usefulness of the problem statement.
Brainstorm: Plant Sanitation (Part III)
June 7, 2013 12:17 pm | by Victor Hayes Popovics, Owner, Ultimate Washer | CommentsThe Food Manufacturing Brainstorm features industry experts sharing their perspectives on issues critical to the overall food industry marketplace. In this issue, we ask: What plant sanitation techniques can food processors employ to improve food safety in their facilities?
Brainstorm: Plant Sanitation (Part II)
June 7, 2013 9:29 am | by Daniel Peterson, Product Manager, Industrial Vacuum Division, Nilfisk-Advance, Inc. | CommentsThe Food Manufacturing Brainstorm features industry experts sharing their perspectives on issues critical to the overall food industry marketplace. In this issue, we ask: What plant sanitation techniques can food processors employ to improve food safety in their facilities?
Brainstorm: Plant Sanitation (Part I)
June 6, 2013 12:20 pm | by Dr. Elis Owens, Senior Microbiologist & Chemist, Birko | CommentsThe Food Manufacturing Brainstorm features industry experts sharing their perspectives on issues critical to the overall food industry marketplace. In this issue, we ask: What plant sanitation techniques can food processors employ to improve food safety in their facilities?
Continuous Improvement: Real Improvement or Mediocrity?
June 5, 2013 12:19 pm | by Mark Latino, President, Reliability Center, Inc. | CommentsManufacturing organizations have been bombarded with initiatives that promise continuous improvement and yet after twenty plus years of initiative after initiative, the reality has at best been incremental improvements. It seems when problems appear the path to solution is to replace parts and get the equipment back into production.
Five Step Plan to Attract Next-Generation Manufacturing Talent
June 5, 2013 9:21 am | by Bobby Rudder, Director of Marketing & Communications, Godlan Inc. | CommentsAs manufacturing specialists visits facilities throughout the U.S. each week, one consistent theme continues to come into focus: the knowledge and skill-level that is exiting organizations through retirement is becoming increasingly difficult to replace with today’s applicant pool.
Does Your Storeroom Database Do This?
June 4, 2013 11:45 am | by Mike Dyson and James Rogers, Storeroom Solutions, Inc. | CommentsYears of “thinking Lean” led many manufacturers to install systems offering visibility to the flow of direct production parts from suppliers to the assembly line. Very few, however, have had the same discipline or success tracking indirect inventory or MRO data.
What Manufacturers Can Learn from the Commandos
June 4, 2013 9:30 am | by Damian McKinney | CommentsDespite a tough climate, globally, manufacturing has continued to grow over the past year — albeit only a slight growth. However, there are always complex problems which can lie just outside the industry’s control ready to work against them.
Be(A)ware of Litigation Involving Caffeinated Products
June 3, 2013 12:22 pm | by Cari Dawson, Partner, Alston & Bird | CommentsThe FDA’s recent investigation of the safety of caffeinated products, particularly the effects of such products on children and adolescents, is top-of-mind for food and beverage manufacturers. The recent litigation involving Monster Beverage Corporation is a matter of which all manufacturers of caffeinated products should both be aware and beware.
Developing a Workforce
June 3, 2013 9:32 am | by Maria Ferrante, Vice President, Education & Workforce Development, PMMI | CommentsManufacturers are on the cusp of a major generational shift. Baby Boomers are preparing to retire out of the workforce, and Gen Y is poised to replace them. However, several obstacles are preventing a seamless transition of Gen Y-ers into these soon-to-be vacant roles.
Bulletproofing Virtualized IT Environments
May 30, 2013 1:52 pm | by Frank Hill, Director of Manufacturing Business Development, Stratus Technologies | CommentsToday, many popular manufacturing applications are certified for virtualization and with good reason. The benefits of virtualization, including cost control, higher productivity, and better long-term planning, are indisputable. Yet, some manufacturing engineers and plant IT departments are missing out on these benefits because they think virtualization involves too much risk.
MRO Data Key To Unlocking Cost Savings & Operational Efficiency
May 30, 2013 1:14 pm | by IHS | CommentsMaintenance, repair and operations (MRO) groups at many companies are facing a major challenge: toxic MRO master catalogs stuffed with incomplete data on replacement parts, a problem that drives up costs and creates large-scale problems for multiple corporate divisions.
