Manufacturers in the food, confectionery, pharmaceutical and cosmetics sectors are clearly opting to invest long-term in a TLM machine from Schubert. The company is known for its commitment to long-term partnerships with customers. In order to further increase the benefits of these partnerships, Schubert is not only expanding its global service portfolio, but is also making its GRIPS.world digital platform available. This solution, is aimed at entirely avoiding downtimes and therefore unplanned service calls in the future. Customers in North America also benefit from the expansion of the machine manufacturer’s training center in Charlotte, where a recently installed training machine is now available for hands-on operator training. The training sessions at Schubert North Americas facilities ensure that customers can count on reliable and smooth operation with the TLM system.

Hartmut Siegel, chief executive officer of Schubert North America, has been responsible for developing the most important growth market for the Schubert Group since July 2018. “Together with our well-trained team at our three locations in Charlotte, Dallas and Mississauga (Canada), I am eager to drive forward the pursuit of our increasing market success in North America and to further expand our service offering,” explains Hartmut Siegel. The US headquarters in Charlotte were recently equipped with a new, latest-generation training machine. Training for operators of Schubert systems is a key facet of Schubert’s service offering, with which the company ensures the highest level of production reliability over the entire lifecycle of the systems.

Production safety through digital solutions

Digitalization plays a major role in Schubert’s service strategy. With GRIPS.world, the company now offers its customers a digital platform which can significantly improve service performance and plant availability. Manufacturers will greatly benefit from digital networking since it enables them to increase the efficiency and availability of their production facilities. From now on, all TLM machines from Schubert are ready to connect to this digital platform on customer request. In the mid-term, it will open up new opportunities for preventive maintenance and communication with customers.

Data sovereignty, of course, lies entirely with the customer. If an intervention by a Schubert service technician is required, remote maintenance can be activated by the customer. With the data collected, predictive maintenance can be used to identify potential problems at an early stage, thereby avoiding downtime and unplanned service calls. In the future, the system will forward error messages or possible causes of an impending failure to the responsible employee, e.g. via mobile devices. This notification will take place even before the actual part wears out, therefore avoiding a costly failure. The operator then receives suggestions for remedial action from the program. The objective is to entirely avoid unplanned downtime.

A practical example at the Schubert stand provides visitors with preliminary insight into the potential that GRIPS.world offers – possibilities that will go far beyond predictive maintenance and status monitoring. In the context of the application presented, a fictitious production manager receives a notification on his mobile device about an issue relating to his TLM system. This takes place within the scope of “predictive maintenance” even before the actual wear could lead to a failure. The program then proposes possible remedial measures to the production manager – and the program intuitively guides him through the next steps.