At a glance Country: JapanIndustry: ManufacturingFounded: 1875Website: shimadzu.co.jp

ChallengeShimadzu found that problems on its SMT production line were diffi cult to identify and time-consuming to resolve, leading to bottlenecks and ineffi ciencies. The company wanted to fi nd a smarter approach to monitoring production.

SolutionAfter evaluating the market, Shimadzu turned to FUJITSU VisuaLine, an IoT solution that visualizes the operational status of the manufacturing process, enabling it to quickly discover anomalies that would not otherwise be discovered.

Benefi t■ Productivity has improved by 15 percent

in six months

■ Clear graphical representation of the print board production line improves operational effi ciency

■ Visualizing data makes issues easily recognizable and speeds resolution time

■ Bottlenecks have been eliminated and pre-operation set-up time has been reduced

Shimadzu has deployed FUJITSU VisuaLine to more effi ciently identify manufacturing defects during the production process, improving productivity by 15 percent.

Kazushi YoshihisaGeneral ManagerManufacturing Center, Shimadzu

“ Productivity has improved by 15 percent since the implementation of FUJITSU VisuaLine and we expect further increased productivity by tackling unsolved problems.”

CUSTOMER CASE STUDY

Lacking production visibilityShimadzu is keen to embrace new technologies, with a focus on IoT and the ‘smart factory’. This is because traditional manufacturing methods are ineffi cient, time-consuming and involve signifi cant human intervention. As a result, the company wanted to improve its surface mount technology (SMT) line for enhanced productivity.

“There are many hard-to-identify ineffi ciencies within the factory. However, we struggle to grasp the problem in real-time, and as a result, solutions are delayed, and the whole cycle tends to be lengthy,” explains Akio Konishi, General Manager, Business Systems Management Department, Shimadzu. “By incorporating state-of-the-art technology into improving activities on-site, we aim to be able to take action faster. For this, we put a lot of effort in establishing open communication in our factories by sharing the information of current problems we face with our employees.”

Despite continuous improvements of the SMT line, the company felt more could be done and was confi dent that introducing visualization to the production line to identify issues was the next step.

“When problems occurred in the past, we actually were unable to identify them. There was a time when our suggested solutions did not work as we had hoped, because we did not understand the root cause of the problems,” adds Yoshihisa, General Manager, Manufacturing Center, Shimadzu. “Therefore, the productivity did not improve as we expected.”

Visualizing an IoT futureShimadzu turned to FUJITSU Manufacturing Industry Solution VisuaLine, an IoT solution that visualizes the operational status of the manufacturing process based on log data of operating results collected from a factory’s equipment. This solution collects log data from the manufacturing equipment used in the production process, and visualizes the operational status in a variety of formats, such as graphs.

“I fell in love with the system at fi rst sight. I reviewed many products by other companies before making my fi nal decision, but the system of VisuaLine was overwhelmingly easy to understand,” says Yoshihisa.

By comparing graphs on a daily basis, users can at a glance see portions of the process that are taking more time than usual, enabling them to quickly discover anomalies that would not otherwise be discovered unless they caused the equipment to set off an alarm or cease operation. For example, a bubble chart shows when errors occur, so that the presence or absence of a problem could be understood intuitively.

“The intuitive system not only delivers better understanding of the situation but also enables us to investigate the problems in detail,” comments Konishi. “Analyzing the data can also help us improve the process.”

Every employee can now quickly identify and confi rm where production is stagnant, via a large monitor beside the SMT lines, which displays VisuaLine data. Reviewing VisuaLine data can also be done remotely.

Improved effi ciency for faster productionThe lines that have implemented VisuaLine have successfully reduced the number of operation hours by 320 hours in the six months since its introduction while productivity has also improved by 15 percent.

“Previously, when trouble occurred, the equipment log was transferred to Excel then analyzed, which took about 30 minutes. With VisuaLine, we can identify and understand the problem at a glance,” remarks Hiroki Togashi, Production Engineer, Manufacturing Center, Shimadzu. “This was the fi rst time for us to tackle problems with such a different perspective. Our focus point used to only be the fl ow of processes in the factory, not the design of machines. However, the proposal with a primary focus on balancing the cycle time went surprisingly well.”

The system contributes to overall optimization as employees can give effi cient feedback to the management based on the problems grasped via the visualized data of SMT lines. This has enabled Shimadzu to eliminate bottlenecks during the production process and reduce pre-operation set-up times.

“Our productivity had been stagnant and we struggled to see the improvements despite our continuous efforts. However, the productivity has improved by 15 percent since the implementation of VisuaLine,” adds Yoshihisa. “In fact, according to the system, we currently have many more areas that need to be improved. In that sense, we expect further increased productivity by tackling unsolved problems.”

The company also plans to implement VisuaLine in its factories in the Philippines which have similar SMT lines. Konishi concludes: “As a pioneer in implementing VisuaLine with the necessary knowledge, we will take the initiative to share the information with our factories in the Philippines. Therefore, we all will be able to cooperate with each other to solve problems at all levels in our organization.”

CustomerShimadzu Corporation was established by Genzo Shimadzu in 1875 to manufacture physics and chemistry instruments in Kyoto. The company’s technical capability was proven when one of its employees became the fi rst researcher working at a private company to win the Nobel Prize for Chemistry. The company has contributed greatly towards the development of Japanese manufacturing technologies by developing the most advanced, high-quality analytical and measuring instruments.

Products and services ■ FUJITSU Manufacturing Industry Solution VisuaLine

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