Greater Mobility for Large Battery Manufacturer in Italy

Project Scope

• Tags: 200
• Screens: 10
• Clients: 40
• Alarms: 10
• Devices: Tablet, smartphones, PC
• Architecture: Standard redundant with WebDev and Perspective
• Databases: 4 (MS SQL Server)
• Historical data logged: 200 tags since 2016

Project Overview

Quality assurance, progress reports, and product documentation were done through paperwork. The standard MES solution had a hard time connecting to equipment such as simple scales. It was also difficult to implement needed customizations. This all led to more time needed for data entry, delayed communication of issues, delayed solutions, and a lot of hardware to be maintained by the IT department.

HTC offered HyperMES on Perspective. Ignition Perspective offers a one-stop solution for the connection to equipment and scales, and it’s made for mobile-first design. HyperMES is a collaborative manufacturing solution that’s easy to deploy, with a natural usability grade featuring usual gestures for human interaction and full use of mobile peripherals. With a very small investment, HTC was able to offer a one-stop solution that eliminates paper. 

HTC integrated SAP, the PLM system and the LIMS through the Web Dev Module, avoiding the SQL tables and file exchange. Every system cooperates in real time using the REST interface. Manufacturing operators’ guides are requested in real time to the PLM that shares documents so the operator can search information without downloading or flipping through paper documents. No more PCs, monitors, mouses, keyboards, printers, or handheld barcode scanners. Everything that is needed is online, available at the moment it’s needed, in the single device (tablet or smartphone) that everyone is familiar with.

Not every operation was automation-controlled; some were manual. HyperMES offered the opportunity to easily integrate manual operations so the process is integrated end-to-end with the same set of features. The launch of an operation, the delivery of information, and the collection of test data were integrated on the same paradigm.

Operators adopted the solution immediately for its easy-to-use interface. Data is now in real time and feedback to the operator can be in the same view where they collect information. Documents on the shop floor are immediately available, always updated, accessible on a need-to-have basis, available with the right version.

The hardware investment and maintenance costs were reduced. The rich set of drivers and the flexibility of Ignition make connections simple.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, it was mandatory to reduce people going back and forth to the shop floor to collect samples, to retrieve reports, or to deploy manufacturing specification or assembly instructions. This was possible because HyperMES collects and delivers information without the need for paper.