Director Product Management Software Solutions
SMT topics in focus
Today's production processes are characterized by great individuality and diversity: no two productions are alike. The same applies to the teams that organize, optimize and keep production running. The goal of the WORKS Software Suite is to make their work easier and to design and manage workflows optimally in order to get the best out of the production lines.
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Different fields of activity have different requirements for software-supported process control and optimization. WORKS has a smart solution for this: All programs use the same data and support the seamless exchange of information. In this way, WORKS ensures that each employee is optimally supported in his or her individual area of responsibility.
Hint: Click on the tabs to find out what benefits WORKS offers employees - depending on their field of activity - in SMT production.
The production manager ensures cost-effective production by introducing the right equipment and processes. They decide which effort will be made for a product and plan its efficient production, all while keeping a constant eye on costs ranging from the raw materials to the labor effort during the production to shipping. To do this, they must transparently communicate the operation’s compliance with the cost frameworks at all times.On many production lines, determining the most important performance indicators is still a slow, cumbersome, and error-prone process with tools such as homebuild process control solutions, Power BI, Excel sheets, or reports in PowerPoint or PDF formats. With WORKS, the production manager can keep an eye on workflows such as Monitoring, Operations, and Integration at all times.
The production supervisor keeps an eye on the entire production and ensures that all processes operate smoothly and efficiently. To do this, they organize and monitor workflows and employees. Their overarching goals are quality and profitability. They permanently improve daily operations and minimize costs. Workflows that are particularly important for the Production Supervisor are Planning, Preparation, Operations, and Monitoring.Which task should I do next? Whom can I call when something unforeseen happens? What was the cause of the machine shutdown last week? The production supervisor and their employees ask themselves questions like these again and again. In many factories, they still operate with whiteboards, flip charts, Excel sheets, or collaboration tools such as SharePoint. The bottom line: lots of effort, many potential sources of errors, and little clarity.With WORKS, questions like the ones listed above are answered quickly and efficiently – without much effort, from a single launchpad with a clear and comprehensive display.
The production planner coordinates the production workflows for single or multiple products. They plan and prioritize the production steps, guarantee maximum performance, and avoid delays. They allocate manpower, equipment, and raw materials in accordance with the production requirements.Planning tasks such as the daily organization of the SMT lines and the timing of setup changeovers still cause a lot of unnecessary effort. In many cases, the wheel is invented again and again when similar products must be set up because the regular person in charge is on vacation or not available for other reasons. Complex Excel sheets, manually obtaining data from the homebuild process control solutions and even advanced planning systems (APS) don’t make this any easier.Not so with WORKS. It makes it possible to automate most of the planning process so that the important workflows Planning, Preparation, Operations and Material Management are always under control, thus minimizing costs and maximizing benefits.
The process engineer takes care of ongoing processes in electronics manufacturing, ranging from ordering to production start-up to certification. They assess processes, interpret data, and take appropriate measures. Based on this, they design, test, and operate systems and processes and take care of upgrades and enhancements.What happens, however, when a process gets out of control? Are the right analytical and decision-making tools available? Does the company have time to get involved in experiments? In most cases, the answer is “no”, especially if the company still depends on PLM software, long and confusing Excel lists or even printouts, or manually collected machine data. On most shop floors, it is still extremely difficult and time-consuming to determine the exact causes of malfunctions and take the right measures.WORKS helps the process engineer to automate the processes of important workflows such as Programming, Operations, Optimization, and Monitoring. They not only save time but benefit from comprehensive data collection and analysis.
As the person in charge of the procurement and storage of components and consumables in electronics manufacturing, the material logistics manager is responsible for the entire supply chain. They ensure that the flow of materials to the production never stops.Unfortunately, the MES has probably never automatically told them where certain components are physically located or generated unique component IDs. Questions also arise as to whether the machines automatically order new material when the existing supply is about to run out, or whether material is automatically pre-sorted and delivered from the warehouse to the setup preparation area. While MES and ERP systems can do a lot, they almost never go into this level of detail.WORKS controls and automates all these logistics processes for the material logistics manager and his/her team based on the workflows Material Management, Planning, Preparation, and Integration.
The IT operations manager monitors the network infrastructure and takes immediate action when a problem occurs. Experienced in performance management, network administration and system security, they ensure that all IT systems in electronics production are secure and run reliably at all times.The large number of different interfaces on the shop floor continues to cause occasional connection problems – for example, when certain areas require an upgrade. Proprietary interfaces pose the greatest obstacle to efficient operation. In its Integration workflow, WORKS ensures seamless communication with its standardized Operations Information Broker (OIB) so that all important data is available and accessible at all times.
No two electronics factories are alike, but there are eight general workflows that describe their production processes. Based on these workflows, users can identify the WORKS components that are relevant for them and combine them into the individual application packages.
You want to automate your planning process as much as possible while keeping it highly flexible. WORKS accomplishes precisely that, thus ensuring on-time deliveries and happy customers. Fully networked planning tools reflect capacities, restrictions and even short-term interruptions seamlessly, thus increasing the quality and reliability of your planning – all while maintaining contact with your company’s ERP system and allowing you to optimize your planning and setup changeover costs.
You can improve your productivity already during the programming process. With its uniform programming environment, WORKS lets you program all your SMT lines quickly and conveniently. WORKS ensures the creation and validation of placement programs for multiple lines with features ranging from CAD data importation to component descriptions to placement simulations. Printing programs are created offline, administered in a central database, and downloaded to the line together with the placement programs when the production run starts.
Material management is critical for the success of your production operations. What you need are integrated material flow solutions that don’t just administer inventories but actively support all material-related processes on the factory floor. With WORKS, you get complete and process-oriented transparency and administration of materials from receiving to placement. It provides an overview of the availability of materials prior to production: What components are actually on hand? Where are they physically located? Which components must not be used? WORKS answers all these questions – before bottlenecks and machine downtimes can slow down your production.
In today’s closely linked and time-critical production processes, even the smallest setup error can be a real efficiency killer. WORKS is the ideal and easy-to-use partner for quick, error-free setups and order management. The work preparation module can determine and monitor the production order and actively monitor the machine setups. The result: faster and more efficient setups and uninterrupted production.
To ensure maximum productivity and quality, SMT production lines must run continuously. Comprehensive material control on each line and the intelligent, automated distribution of tasks are crucial for a smooth, continuous operation. WORKS offers all the essentials in a single interface and helps you to assign your employees to the appropriate tasks in accordance with their availability and skills. The result: faster response times and improved line productivity.
Making continuous improvements in your production ensures the future viability and competitiveness of your entire company and is a major factor in the productivity of highly flexible factories. So why not take advantage of expert systems that are available 24/7? They maximize your quality and first yield rates at all times by identifying on their own the settings that ensure process stability. Artificial intelligence helps to optimize processes automatically and autonomously. The benefits: stable printing processes, significant time savings, reduced costs, and improved productivity.
Only what is measured can be improved and ultimately optimized. This is especially true in electronics manufacturing, and WORKS offers innovative possibilities for doing it. It collects and displays data from the machines directly, automatically and in real time so that you can monitor the production status at all times in the form of KPIs. Factory monitoring in real time enables you to respond instantly to all sorts of events while the flexible analysis of historical data highlights trends and process changes.
The success of automation in your electronics production stands and falls with the availability of easy-to-operate interfaces and data hubs for the free flow of data. Open interfaces and transparency are key in this context. WORKS features both and ensures that all production-relevant data flows to where it is needed, for example to the MES. In this way, old systems can be replaced, and new systems integrated quickly and easily.
WORKS Operations bundles, prioritizes and distributes tasks from production across lines and skill-based to operators with mobile devices. This shortens response times and ensures the effective deployment of skilled workers.
With the goal of zero DPMO, WORKS Optimization optimizes the printing and placement process – at best fully automatically in the case of solder paste printing. Based on IPC-2591 CFX, third-party SPI and AOI systems can be integrated.
For maximum production times and on-time order fulfillment, WORKS Planning brings together ERP data and production data from the shopfloor in real time. This allows planners to effectively control production and simplify or eliminate setup operations.
As the industry’s technology leader, ASMPT offers a broad portfolio of best-in-class products. Our solutions stand out with their perfect interaction of hardware, software and service components – powerful, smart, and ready to raise your production to a new level.