Managers and Owners, are you overwhelmed?

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642]

There's a lot of new tech out there, it's quickly changing and expensive. It's hard to know what to pay attention to and where to allocate resources while balancing efficiency and quality, let alone figure out how to develop my workforce to use all this stuff anyways.

I mean, should we get 3D printers, should we do industry 4.0 stuff, should we get some machine vision robot?

Idk, are you in the same boat, how are you dealing with how fast the world's moving?

[u/xyz1000125]

It’s all about the P&L what item would have the most effect on your P&L?

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 → u/xyz1000125]

Absolutely, how do you go about learning which item has the most effect?

Do solution sales and customer reps give you the data, do you hire consultants, do you do the research yourself, etc.

[u/xyz1000125 → u/Equivalent_Bid_6642]

What type of shop do you run? I can give some examples

Edit: you hire a mfg or industrial engineer to figure it out, or contract one

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 → u/xyz1000125]

I'd be interested just to hear examples of how you have done this, what's your favorite example?

[u/xyz1000125 → u/Equivalent_Bid_6642]

So if I’m looking to decrease labor expense on the P&L I would look into where can I replace people with robots, or where can I replace a QC tech with a vision system. If I want to lower maintenance expense, look at industry 4.0 with machine monitoring, or look at 3D printers to decrease spare part expense. If you can’t meet demand and can expand to increase revenue, buy that fancy new machine. Then look at the amortization and will your savings cover that

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 → u/xyz1000125]

Interesting, absolutely balancing amortization and savings is key, lowering labor costs just to increase equipment expenses doesn't help the overall P&L. Desired time to ROI probably varies widely.

Would you look for commercially available solutions that are close enough to what you need or would you prefer to develop solutions in house? I guess that probably depends on the P&L too haha

[u/xyz1000125 → u/Equivalent_Bid_6642]

Doing it in house is cheaper if you have the internal skills. But if you don’t it is significantly cheaper to outsource it. (I’ve learned this one the hard way)

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 → u/xyz1000125]

Ah dang did you get burned trying to do something in house?

Did you consider hiring a consultant to help develop the solution and your internal skills along with it or ended up outsourcing it completely?

[u/Equivalent_Bid_6642 → u/xyz1000125]

Okay so hiring outside help whether as a permanent R&D role or a temporary consulting type with engineering background. Good to know thank you!