Mold manufacturing industry faces challenges

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Molds are a classic example of one-off production, designed and manufactured according to orders, discrete manufacturing. Making molds is difficult, managing mold production is even harder.

Unit production

Typical piece production, designed and manufactured according to orders, results in low levels of design and process standardization; frequent design changes; inconsistent management of BOM, drawings, and other documentation; and unique processing for components, excluding standard parts.

Production process is not transparent

Production process information is lagging and opaque, making it impossible to obtain real-time status of various business stages. This necessitates repeated follow-ups and high communication costs, directly leading to the difficulty in the workshop's role of supervision and coordination, and there is no mention of controlling production.

Long mold-making cycle

Generally, it continues the traditional mold-making management model of fitter, lacking planned control and工艺 guidance in processing. The personal awareness of the mold-making master greatly determines the manufacturing cycle of the mold, so the cycle usually drags on for a long time.

Mold History Traceability

Can't find the mold during production? Spend half a day locating it, only to discover no records on the mold? Install the mold on the machine, and only then find quality issues that require repairs, maintenance, or part replacements to continue production.

Nine Management Challenges for Molding Enterprises

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Compared to traditional manufacturing, molds are not produced after the BOM and process are essentially finalized. Therefore, the parallel design and manufacturing mode of molds brings greater difficulty to mold management.

Design management is challenging

How to code material for mold factory? BOM manually prepared is prone to omissions, repetitions, and errors, and design changes are frequent.

Mold quotation is challenging

How to conduct material, labor, and cost analysis and provide a quick and accurate quotation based on the customer's provided samples or drawings

Project tracking is challenging

Unable to keep up-to-date with the progress of each mold's design, processing, fitting, and trial molding, making it difficult to establish customer trust.

Crafting process challenging

Unable to quickly establish process sheets, unable to accurately assess the planned labor hours for each part

Challenges in scheduling

Schedule planning for departments/machines/individuals, frequent mold modifications, equal emphasis on in-house and outsourced production

Factory statistics are challenging

Workshop statistics are not timely, machine utilization is low, and personnel management is difficult. How to establish employee performance metrics?

Quality Control Challenges

Many suppliers, difficult to control incoming material quality, full process inspection, complex quality abnormality handling procedures

Procurement collaboration challenges

A wide variety of materials, distinguishing standard and non-standard parts, short procurement cycle, minimal stock in warehouse, and urgent outsourcing.

Cost accounting is challenging

Mold costs must be accounted for at each process, and there are frequent new moldings, repairs, and rework, making trial mold costs uncontrollable.

Fangtian Mold Cloud Value

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Mature architecture of industrial internet platforms facilitates mold integration into the cloud ecosystem, offering digital combat power, full-process monitoring, and transparent manufacturing management, creating core competitive advantages.

Mold Quotation and Cost Analysis

Conduct cost analysis and quotation based on the samples or drawings provided by the customer. Real-time monitor the actual costs incurred during the mold production process, such as whether the material and labor costs for certain parts exceed the budget? Which projects were initially underquoted? Molding trial runs and repairs lead to repeated trial costs and cost alerts for anomalies.

Mold Design and Process Management

Stay updated on design progress in real-time, automatically notify relevant personnel for design changes and anomalies, and strive to minimize the loss from design modifications. Capable of integrating with CAD and other design software, automatically generate BOM sheets through drawings. Paperless workshop for drawings, directly view mold part drawings to reduce the risk of loss during transmission.

Mold Projects and Automated Scheduling

Supports simultaneous production organization for dozens to even hundreds of molds, with each set's production progress displayed on the web page in Gantt chart format. A highly intelligent APS advanced scheduling system can complete the automated scheduling of tens of thousands of processes in just a few seconds. Provides intuitive load rate graphical analysis for balanced production.

Barcode Scanning and Molding Progress

Real-time data collection of production through barcode or RFID chip scanning, reducing the workload of workshop staff while completing the reception of parts at various stages, including loading, unloading, and transferring. With a phone, you can track the distribution of each component of every mold across various processing units, see which have been completed, and which are still pending.

Workshop Bulletin Board and Performance Management

The workshop progress is clearly visible, with the visual board displaying production status and allowing for timely handling of abnormal tasks. Adopting the Amoeba management philosophy to reform the mold workshop's performance management, we analyze the difference between planned and actual working hours, and boost employees' enthusiasm and cohesion through performance reports, enhancing production efficiency.

Digital Factory Application Scenarios for Molding Enterprises

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Real-time collection of on-site manufacturing process information (such as personnel, materials, equipment, and quality) enhances on-site transparency and improves control capabilities. Workshop visual electronic bulletin boards monitor and manage production, equipment, quality, materials, and anomalies, assisting mold enterprises in building a multifaceted digital factory.