Learning with real-time production data at Scandi Standard

Scandi Standard is one of the leading companies in the chicken processing industry and a very experienced user of Factbird, monitoring their daily production with customized dashboards and reports that make the real-time data more visual for the whole organization.

Their first Factbird solution was installed in 2018 and they were amazed by how it could be installed in a few minutes and started delivering real-time data immediately. They installed the system on more than 150 production lines in 5 countries, within just 12 months. This was possible both because of the strong initiative from the company’s management team and because of the plug-and-play installation of the Factbird DUO® hardware.

The data from the Factbird system has improved corporate data transparency and enabled the availability of data for benchmarking and knowledge sharing across factories. They use it for continuous improvement across the plants to provide the high-quality processed products, whereby the data from the production machines has become a more and more important source for improvement. The focus on improvement was also reflected in their supply chain (S&OP – Sales and Operations Planning) where the focus on capacity and flow flexibility has been important for the daily batch plan.

When implementing Factbird, it is important to get the employees onboard and use it actively. Scandi Standard, therefore, continues to constantly train their employees to ensure focus and correct registrations, resulting in more valid and trustworthy data. Thereby they ensure that they are acting on true data and are able to take fact-based decisions faster.

The “high level” of validated data fostered monitoring and work more intensely with their data. An example is the work to improve and streamline the changeovers within the packing areas. The data and video material provided by the FactBird View solution allowed them to assess and analyze each element within the changeovers more closely and reduced the “critical” changeovers by up to 40%.

Last year, Scandi Standard got a new idea: If they could customize data visualization to monitor factory efficiency across multiple lines using simple graphics displays, everyone would benefit from a good overview of how they are doing - in real-time.

Scandi Standard and the Factbird team made an interface solution for their "Power BI” (Microsoft business intelligence software) with just a simple customization. No big investment or time-consuming project was needed, just as there was no need to stop the running production at all. After a few meetings, the customized displays for various purposes were implemented on their shop floor, for example:

• Customized dashboards on multiple screens on the shop floor
• Top 5 stop causes across lines as well as line efficiency toward the target
• Daily and weekly reports that team leaders and the management team receive in their email boxes every day and every week

Customized dashboards on multiple screens are monitored by the team leaders who support the operations of various lines. It helps the team leaders to identify which lines require more attention and to act right away. The days are also easier to plan as the status is visualized on the dashboards.

The team leaders and the management team are glad to receive reports on a regular basis in their emails. This way they can get ready for status meetings or management meetings in a minute. The reports give real-time status updates both daily and weekly, showing what the biggest challenge is. This makes the status meetings more productive as they can discuss necessary solutions right away. The Factbird solution also makes their management meetings “Go to Gemba”, as the Japanese lean philosophy calls it. It ensures that issues are discussed from the same set of facts.

The new customized dashboard solution gives us the advantage to visualize things, and creating value in specific departments and areas. Instead of only 5 “high-level” KPIs (Key Performance Indicator), we try to break them down and visualize how we can impact the different KPI’s. This has had a positive impact and has raised the commitment and understanding of the daily business and how each area/operator can impact the overall goal.

The Performance Manager at Scandi Standard

Scandi Standard’s strong drive and good ideas made the data more useful to run the production more and more efficiently. Scandi Standard is improving day by day by visualizing data.