IPack Grows Revenue by 30 Percent and Improves Product Quality with DELMIAWorks
Innovation Packaging (IPack) produces 65 million injection-molded parts and assembles 30 million components annually. The French company, a leading packaging manufacturer for customers in the fragrance and cosmetics industries, has a reputation for developing highly innovative packaging concepts. IPack develops its packaging products and molds for plastic parts with SOLIDWORKS® 3D design software.
Until 2017, IPACK used Excel® spreadsheets for organizing and scheduling designs and production and an Access® database for capturing and maintaining product and manufacturing data. Sales orders, production orders, bills of materials, material requirements, and scheduling information were all entered into Excel, which the company also used for calculating costs, quoting, and inventory management.
The process was not only time-consuming but also prevented management from having the information and insights necessary to understand what was happening in production and what jobs were making or losing money.
Automating the Process
IPack needed to automate its process with a system that could provide a real-time view of production, enabling management to boost productivity, improve quality, and continue to grow the company. As IPack General Manager Guillaume De Rosa explains, “Many of the ERP systems that were evaluated—such as SAP®, Microsoft Dynamics®, and Epicore®—were general purpose in their approach and not well-suited for our injection-molding operations.”
“When we started looking into manufacturing execution systems (MES), we discovered DELMIAWorks®, which is a shop floor-first solution,” De Rosa notes. “DELMIAWorks was the only system that could output a specific bill of material for each job.” IPack chose to implement DELMIAWorks because it specifically supports manufacturing processes, including injection molding, and provides the capabilities that will help the company continue to increase productivity and make better decisions for growth.
Prevailing Over the Unexpected
The implementation of DELMIAWorks ERP in 2017 enabled IPack management to gain a more accurate understanding of the cost of goods sold and to better manage inventory, which proved to be critically important when the economic downturn associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and related supply chain issues stressed the company’s operations in 2020.
“DELMIAWorks helped us to further automate our operations and have a more precise understanding of the cost of goods sold, and we probably would not have been able to survive the economic downturn associated with the pandemic without it,” De Rosa continues. “Things happen on the shop floor, and with DELMIAWorks, we have a real-time view of what’s going on and a detailed history of every job. This allows us to improve operational efficiency and create a culture of continuous improvement.”
Increasing Productivity
With DELMIAWorks solutions, IPack has automated its injection-molding operations, realized real-time monitoring of all manufacturing operations, and gained more accurate insights into its business, resulting in increased productivity, improved quality, and lower costs. “DELMIAWorks allows us to be much more precise during estimating and production planning, which helps us make better decisions, improve profit margins, increase throughput, and cut costs,” De Rosa stresses.
Since implementing DELMIAWorks, IPack has reduced the cost of goods sold, realized savings of 5 to 10 percent on inventory management, and improved its supply chain management. “We’re now making money on every job,” De Rosa adds. “Our revenue has increased by 30 percent. With DELMIAWorks in place, a culture of continuous improvement has taken hold at IPack, and we are well-positioned for future growth.”
If you’d like more information about how you can prevail over your design and manufacturing challenges with SOLIDWORKS and DELMIAWorks, contact a DELMIAWorks specialist now.