The “Cost Chain Reaction” of non-conformance and how Blockchain can eliminate it.
Defects are inevitable. Even a capable and stable process will produce non-conformance to the original specification both visually and dimensionally. This is easily done through small variations in temperature of the room which your machines are in, humidity and wear and tear. With every defect comes a painfully long process of raising a concession. Apart from the fact that this is a time-consuming activity, we also face the risk of incorrect sentencing and very high costs.
So, what should you do when you create non-conformance?
The answer is quite straight forward… You shouldn’t be doing a lot!
When non-conformance is produced, the defect has to be evaluated, sentenced and approved by both the inspector and designer. This is normally a lengthy manual process which can take several weeks, especially in the aerospace industry. As you can imagine, this carries a significant impact on lead times, productivity and cash.
In order to avoid these consequences, you should think about automating your concession assessment.
Inviso Technologies had created an automated assessment system for a gas turbine provider which resulted in a time reduction from 7 days to 2 minutes and a £2.4m annual cost saving. More specifically, the evaluation process was automated by specifying a set of rules to apply to the data and allowing the system to compare current defects to the database of “Good/No Good” examples. Along with the large sum of money saved, the company also benefited from an increased capacity and a reduced inventory. Of course, this number could fluctuate for different manufacturers depending on cost of components and volume of non-conforming parts produced.
Source: Industry 4.0 Case Study: Automated Inspection Software offers £24 million saving,
The case above is just a minuscule example of the true potential of Industry 4.0 and the possibilities are endless. Although process control technology has advanced significantly since the 1980’s the full benefits of machine to machine (M2M) communications, Internet of Things (IoT) and big data processing technology are not being realised.
Industry 4.0 is dependent on connected, intelligent systems that are able to communicate, understand and react to the given information in real-time. Process control is the essence of any manufacturing process and it is therefore critical to Industry 4.0.
Now let’s talk about the new superhero we know we need!
Manufactory aims to develop and deploy a platform which accelerates expansion of Industry 4.0 and is available for every manufacturer to reap the benefits, regardless of size.
The Manufactory mission is to build a public-private blockchain that will:
• Enable a decentralised global manufacturing supply chain ordering platform.
• Develop a trust and reputation engine for quality control and quality management systems.
• Make the payment and escrow process as simple as possible.
• Provide a real-time manufacturing capacity availability platform.
• Create an incentive engine based on how energy efficiently the component has been manufactured.
- Build a decentralised marketplace the will enable OEM’s to build their own applications to connect to Manufactory.
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This article was originally written by Adrian Bukowski on behalf of the Manufactory Research team.
