Managing Operations Across Multiple Sites – All at the Same Time?

About 80 years ago, scientists discovered that it is possible to be in two locations at the same time—at least for an atom or a subatomic particle, such as an electron.  For such tiny objects, the world is governed by a crazy set of physical laws known as quantum mechanics.

Good news!  You don’t need to have a PhD in quantum mechanics to “be” in multiple places at the same time.

Location can give you the edge in manufacturing.  For that reason, many manufacturers operate multiple facilities in different states and countries, but managing multiple worksites comes with its own set of challenges.  You run the risk of having to spread key resources too thin.  It is often impractical to have a full set of start-up, operations and maintenance experts at every location.  Regional resources commonly fill the void.  Turnover and personnel transfers are the norm. So the question becomes, how do you:

• Monitor all your facilities at once
• Know when greater attention is warranted at a specific location
• Help less experienced employees learn from what they are experiencing in real time

Since it’s impossible to be everywhere at once, businesses are using new models to accomplish their goals and objectives. There is a real opportunity to set yourself apart in the marketplace.  Conversely, mismanagement can lead to product inconsistency and/or unnecessary downtime and inefficiencies.  In the extreme, these misses can damage relationships with your customers and remove any advantage you might have enjoyed by expanding your production in the first place.

AVEVA Insight is changing the rules of “Operational Physics.”  AVEVA Insight is a secure cloud based managed solution for gathering, storing, visualizing and analyzing your manufacturing data.  Insight allows you to be anywhere in the world as long as you have a computer or mobile device and you’re connected to the internet.  It allows you to securely see the entire enterprise operational performance picture.

In addition, if you open up a new greenfield location and all your senior staff cannot be available onsite during start up and in the initial phases, you still have access to all the data coming from that site and your experts can keep an eye on production and train your people all at the same time. Remote alarm notifications on your phone can help you focus on the most critical locations.

Turn-Key Process Solutions (TPS) is an example of one company taking advantage of this tool and changing their rules of Operational Physics.  Click here to watch how.