GKN Powder Metallurgy and WORKERBASE enter a partnership to accelerate the transformational journey of the manufacturing industry and prepare for the new business environment of the post-COVID-19 operation conditions
The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendous short and long-term economic impact on the global manufacturing industry. As the National Association of Manufacturers revealed in a recent survey, in March, 53 percent of organizations in the manufacturing sector expected COVID-19 to change their operations over the coming months and 35 percent are currently facing supply chain disruptions.
![](png/impact-on-manufacturing-web.png)
The ability to operate in a rapidly changing business environment requires organizations to adapt quickly. For years, dynamic customer requirements have been driving increased complexity and the need for shorter development and product life cycles. COVID-19’s impact has drastically accelerated these trends and many companies now need to adapt to increasingly challenging market conditions.
Through over 15 years of research and implementation, GKN Powder Metallurgy identified the most important question companies must ask themselves: How can we acquire real-time data from production processes for full production transparency while still empowering our employees to act on the data in real time?
GKN Powder Metallurgy has partnered with leading software platform provider WORKERBASE to create an agile, data-driven production system. The system implements adaptive processes that allow for quick responses to evolving customer requirements and increasing competitiveness, while adding value for both shareholders and employees.
![](png/lean-to-digital-manufacturing.png)
WORKERBASE is a leading software provider in the field of agile production systems, enabling the creation and management of flexible manufacturing processes utilizing real-time workflows on mobile devices.
“Agile manufacturing has revolutionized our production and has structured how we want to run our operations in the future,” said Paul Mairl, Chief Digital Officer, GKN Powder Metallurgy. “The new normal of manufacturing requires a new way of working. Our partnership with WORKERBASE is an important step on our journey to create a new vision of manufacturing operations: combining a data-driven culture with the best technology and technical solutions.”
WORKERBASE and GKN Powder Metallurgy have now teamed up to create a joint solution for organizations. GKN Powder Metallurgy’s experience in the setup of agile manufacturing processes together with the software solution of WORKERBASE enable manufacturing companies to transform their existing operations into an agile organization.
![](png/role-of-the-operator.png)
“Today’s competitive markets are accelerating the need for flexible and agile production processes to cope with increasingly challenging customer requirements. We are committed to helping our customers along their journey to becoming a digitally-driven business and we are proud GKN Powder Metallurgy shares our vision for the factory of the future,” said Norman Hartmann, CEO and co-founder WORKERBASE. “GKN Powder Metallurgy’s ability to move fast through digital manufacturing is a perfect fit for us. Our customers can now benefit from GKN’ Powder Metallurgy’s experience and can explore all aspects of our solution in a revolutionized new type of production environment.“
For the new way of working in manufacturing, the traditional role- and hierarchy-based organizational type is replaced by a setup which is skill- and competency based. This organizational move relies on employees taking personal responsibility for their own performance and a self-learning working environment. By utilizing technology like mobile devices on the production floor, employees are able to challenge their skill levels and increase their productivity by performing work in a more efficient environment.
While digital manufacturing has made significant improvements to operations in the past, recent industry-changing circumstances have shown that a data-driven approach is now more crucial than ever to any production-based organization. An agile manufacturing strategy provides the greatest opportunity to reinvent the way companies operate.
About GKN Powder Metallurgy
GKN Powder Metallurgy is a full metal shapes solutions provider, shaping powder metal into high performance and high precision components. It provides leading powder metal expertise and process experience to transform ideas into production. The company consists of GKN Hoeganaes, GKN Sinter Metals, and GKN Additive to provide powder materials, conventional components, and Additive Manufacturing production. We combine three focused businesses under one brand. Together it employs over 7,400 problem solvers over 30 locations, setting its global engineering network at the highest standard.
About WORKERBASE
WORKERBASE GmbH is a Munich-based Software provider that increases operational flexibility on the shop-floor. Its mission is help customers build the agile factory, where human workers and machines become part of the same digital ecosystem and where all decisions are based on real-time data to quickly react to changing customer needs. WORKERBASE serves manufacturing companies of all sizes and across all verticals. To learn more visit workerbase.com