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Gumlink A/S, Denmark, decided to sell its chewing gum brands and manufacture products for other companies instead. But manufacturing for business customers required a greater degree of flexibility and efficiency to handle many different gum products and packaging.
Packaging,the final step in Gumlink’s production ensures product freshness, branding and commercial appeal. With a large number of lines, individual machines, product changeovers, operators and change of shifts, Gumlinkrequired a means to automatically monitor the packaging process at a detailed level and analyze the operations information to significantlyimprove efficiency.
“We evaluated Production Management software solutions and suppliers in terms of ease of development and implementation, price and long-term support,” said Gumlink Project Manager MichaelJensen. “It was very important to us that the software would be wellsupported by the manufacturer, and that is was open, so it would integrate easily into our existing hardware and software infrastructure. Furthermore, we wanted to provide enterprise access to the metrics, so web-enabled was a key feature.”
To help transform its packaging lines, Gumlink turned to GE Fanuc for a Production Management software solution, which has enabled the company to access key metrics for improved decision-making, increase production efficiency by 10%, drive the flexibility and scalability needed to introduce new products quickly, and achieve payback in less than three months.
“We measured an increase in production efficiency of 10%,” Jensen said, “which represents 670,000€ per year savings. With payback in three months, we have been delighted with the ability to monitor Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)such as Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) using the GE Fanuc Production Management software and drive our productivity improvements.”
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