Case Study: A Trip to the Smart Factory
“Industry 4.0”: What was once an ambitious vision of the future has now definitely become a reality. This is what our team found at Sandvik Coromant’s production plant in Sweden. In cooperation with our client Okuma Europe the leading manufacturer of tools and tooling solutions has created an intelligent production cell, capable of completely unmanned 24/7 production.
Aside from a state-of-the-art multitasking machine, Okuma provided a customised software solution enabling seamless communication between a robot for tool changes, Sandvik Coromant’s production planning system and the Okuma machine.
Of course we had to see this for ourselves! To research a case study on-site, two of our editors made their way to the small town of Gimo, Sweden. Here, Sandvik Coromant has established one of the world’s largest tool factories housing the new production cell. In our on-site interview, Sandvik Coromant’s Production Unit Director Tools put the company’s vision for the future in no uncertain terms: “We want to create the world’s best factory”.
The story of how Sandvik Coromant and Okuma worked towards achieving this ambitious goal is now being told in multiple trade magazines around the world.