CPT International 4/2019

DIGITALIZATION
Group production site.
Foundry Group pioneers
data-driven productivity project
Partnership sees foundry business make multi-site monitoring a reality.
Work in progress in the
melting shop of a MAT Foundry
Rudi Riedel, President Norican Digital GmbH, Munich
Photo: Norican
What if retrospective analysis
of casting production could
be replaced by real-time
process awareness? If reactive, afterthe-fact
responses to sub-optimal output
could be replaced by proactive
foundry management? What if we
could see at any time, not just how one
site is performing, but how multiple
global sites are performing in relation
to each other?
These are all questions MAT Foundry
Group, Poole, United Kingdom, were
asking. They were approached by longterm
supplier Norican Group with a proposition
– one solution that would answer
all their questions, boost
productivity and make the need to
wonder ‘what if’, redundant.
Unifying the equipment and extensive
foundry solutions expertise of DISA
and Wheelabrator, and the digital
know-how of Norican Digital, an IIoT
solution built around Norican’s Monitizer
platform is now in place. This will
allow MAT Foundry Group to collect,
monitor and analyze complete foundry
data – initially from two of its key
EURAC sites, Poole (UK) and Hradec
(Czech Republic) – to fulfil its productivity
ambitions.
Kick-starting a pioneering
digital collaboration
Comprizing 7 foundries and 8 businesses
located across three continents, MAT
Foundry Group is a world-renowned
specialist in the engineering and manufacture
of cast and machined parts for
the automotive sector.
Prior to the Group’s formation in
2015, the separate companies and respective
foundries were run as standalone
businesses. On bringing the different
entities together under one roof,
the need to identify shared operating
threads and strategic partnerships
became clear. For Shaun Lindfield, Head
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