The total value of our purchase orders decreased 15%
Before using MATRIX
Our company was expanding with Industry 4.0, buying new CNC machines to improve our products and to reduce our production times. We were also recruiting new operators for these machines. When it came to storing tools, we used a traditional inventory management method with cabinets next to CNC machines or in the storage room. However, we didn't keep track of their numbers.
If an operator found a tool out of stock, he would ask the production manager or the purchases manager to order it from a supplier. Tools don't appear magically in a second, so we would stop the machine to wait for them to arrive or change the setup to use a different tool. Sometimes, the tool never came in because we forgot to order it, which meant even longer machine downtime. Not to mention that an operator might have looked all over the company to find the production manager to order these missing tools.
To make sure we don't run out of tools, we have ordered too many items and had deadstock in the past. There was also a time when we had duplicated an order for an expensive tool because we didn't know whether we had the tool in stock. Obviously, our inventory was poorly managed with a lot of money invested in unnecessary items.
Benefits Brought by MATRIX
MATIX's software allows us to control 100% of our tools and maintain just the right amount of stock for 1 week of machining operations. The system helps us eliminate unnecessary stock of items, which led to 15% decrease in the total value of purchase orders the first year we started using MATRIX. Our target for the next year is to decrease overstock even more to reach 25% reduction in the value of purchase orders.
Our purchasing department is now better coordinated with accurate and reliable inventory data from MATRIX and knows the appropriate re-order dates and quantities. The MATIX system also helps our operations management by allowing us to monitor and keep track of tools used by each operator for a specific job on a certain CNC machine. This feature has helped us make sure the same tools for the same amount are used for the same job regardless of the operator.
Our operators have also benefited from MATRIX. The technical department prepares the list of tools needed for each job, and this information is stored in MATRIX. Operators simply look up the job number in the system to retrieve all the required tools. MATRIX allows them to only take out the relevant tools, so operators are basically 100% self-employed without the need to confirm their production managers which tools to use for the job. This has helped us decrease our machine downtime by a large number.
What's even more fascinating is that all the information is in our hands with just one click. Before we had MATRIX, we invested a lot of time gathering data and analyzing it. Now, we can just open the MATRIX software on our computer to review our tool consumption and analytical reports quickly and easily.
Our Unique Idea on Using MATRIX
We have large tools that don't fit in our MATRIX cabinet, so we keep them in our traditional storage and register them in MATRIX software. It's very nice that we can continue using our old cabinets and still control their stock just like all the tools stored within MATRIX.
