Manufacturer Industrial of High Performance Drill Bit Technology Achieves Rapid Implementation & Replaces Legacy PDM System With Agile PLM
Business Challenge
Acquisition Prompts Improvements to PLM Platform and Processes
Providing high quality products to the oil field in a timely manner is critical for ReedHycalogs business success, said Gary Freitag, ReedHycalog Manager Manufacturing Engineering, Singapore. To achieve this we must make sure that all information associated with the product will be made available to the right people in the right version at the right time. This is a monumental task that must be executed with speed and accuracy to maintain our ISO 9001 certification. he added. Before ReedHycalog was acquired by Grant Prideco from Schlumberger in 2002, the company had little choice but to utilize a one size fits all solution via Schlumbergers customized MatrixOne tool. This forced users to modify local business practices to fit the PDM tool. After the purchase of ReedHycalog by Grant Prideco there was good reason to migrate off the customized legacy tool but the timing presented a number of challenges for the project: if they chose to move off the Schlumberger system, they needed to complete the migration in 6 months to avoid significant fees for continued use of their legacy PDM tool. Early in 2004, ReedHycalog embarked on a major expansion of the Singapore facility to shift primary manufacturing for Roller Cone Drill bits from Houston to Singapore. This presented new challenges in sharing information between the critical business functions without interruption, and minimizing down time as the production facilities are dependant on getting drawings and work instructions solely from the PDM. said Freitag. Having global operations with R&D and manufacturing facilities located in the USA, England and Singapore, ReedHycalog needed a centralized product record that was easily accessible by all employees around the world. Furthermore, managing engineering change orders (ECO) across these geographically distributed engineering teams was critical to achieving customer responsiveness, flexibility, and reduced cycle times. Data rationalization will be a critical issue during migration since our performance is affected by errors and rework caused by redundant (and cumbersome) data entry in multiple, fragmented databases. cautioned Freitag.
TM
REEDHYCALOG
HOUSTON, TEXAS
BUSINESS
Global manufacturer of industrial drill bit technology for the oil and gas industry
CHALLENGES
Rapidly migrate from the legacy PDM system Minimize downtime during relocation of manufacturing Ability to scale system to keep pace with growth Provide a single, integrated product view worldwide Data quality issues from redundant databases Lengthy ECO process due to geographically dispersed teams
RESULTS
Fast-track implementation 500 users worldwide within 6 months Improved visibility into engineering Greater efficiency by eliminating errors and rework Reduced ECO cycle time Improved responsiveness via paperless environment Improved product quality
Solution
Real-time Global Visibility and Access to Product Design Data
ReedHycalog assigned a multi-national evaluation and implementation team in early 2003 from offices around the world that consisted of dedicated staff highly experienced in PLM and change management. The team was tasked with reducing several instances of design and manufacturing data held around the world to a single, integrated repository for product development and manufacturing and improving the approval process prior to implementation in order to make it simpler, flatter and faster.
CONTINUED ON BACK
Agile enabled us to rapidly implement a new PLM system that has made us more efficient, and helps us to share information in globally real-time. Without a system like Agile PLM we could not have been so successful. Gary Freitag
ReedHycalog Manager, Manufacturing Engineering, Singapore
After an extensive selection process, we felt Agile was the best choice because of the lower true cost of ownership, easy to use interface, connectivity with our Material Requirement Planning (MRP) System and strength in making mass changes Freitag stated. Rather than changing the business practices to suit the PLM requirements, Agiles flexibility allowed greater acceptance by the users and the training needs were minimized. And by using the Agile Product Collaboration solution, product design data is now exchanged in real time. he added. The worldwide implementation team worked around the clock to successfully launch the new 500 user system and oversee the integration and rationalization of information from multiple databases all within a period of just 6 months! ReedHycalogs great bunch of dedicated people as well as unfailing support from Agile was key to our success and our experience to date has strongly validated this choice noted Freitag.
ReedHycalog chose Agile PLM for the following capabilities:
Rapid, seamless implementation and user adoption Unified access to design drawings and changes within a single, management framework Capability to adapt to their business model and easily make mass changes Scalability to match the growth of the companys operations Global on-demand access and better product data visibility for multiple locations Lower total cost of ownership the ease of use resulted in reduced staffing and change management requirements
Benefits
Rapid implementation: Using Agile PLM, ReedHycalog successfully replaced a legacy one size fits all PDM system with one that truly reflects ReedHycalogs business practices. The intuitive system enabled easy and rapid adoption by 500 users, many who did not speak English. Improved Visibility: Agile PLM achieves global visibility via a single, worldwide PLM tool helping to cultivate an integrated company climate for the workforce. Since the initial implementation, we have gone live with three more manufacturing sites. New users find that Agile PLM is simple to use and less complicated than they believed i...