SMARTER MANUFACTURING DELIVERS GREATER VALUE

A project to help West Midlands manufacturing and engineering firms adopt the latest technology has seen more than £10 million in value generated since its launch last summer.

The project is part of the Made Smarter programme, a £1.9 million scheme which helps SMEs in the manufacturing and engineering sectors understand and adopt industrial digitalisation.

Made Smarter was created following an industry-led review in 2017 of how UK manufacturing industries can prosper through digital tools and innovation.

And figures from WMG, University of Warwick, and the Manufacturing Technology Centre in Coventry show the total three-year Gross Value Added (GVA) to companies signing up to the scheme has already reached £11.7 million from a grant spend of just over £200,000.

So far, around 175 companies have signed up to receive support through the scheme.

Each one is promised a visit from experts from either WMG or the MTC to look at the company’s operations and advise what technology could help them move forward.

A ‘digital roadmap’ is produced, showing steps the company needs to take to get there. Businesses then receive further technical support from the experts to plan, develop or implement these changes.

Advice is also given from one of Made Smarter’s digital technology specialists for each Growth Hub area, who can point the company in the right direction for grant funding and other forms of support.

The West Midlands Growth Hubs are working closely with West Midlands Combined Authority and the MTC in Coventry and WMG, at the University of Warwick.

Nasar Jockey, Principal Engineer at WMG, University of Warwick, said: “To have reached these three-year GVA figures in such a short space of time is fantastic news, and shows just how much impact Made Smarter is having.

“Having digital experts visit businesses directly, recommend new technologies to adopt and help them with applying for grants makes such a difference compared to businesses that try to go it alone.”

Meech International expands UK production facilities

Meech International, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of static control, web cleaning and compressed air technology is to expand its Oxfordshire headquarters with a new 29,000 sq ft production facility at Tungsten Park at Witney.

Meech’s products are used extensively in a wide range of industries including printing, packaging, converting, plastics, automotive, pharmaceutical and food production.

£5m West of England digital engineering research project drives recovery

In 2020, the Digital Engineering Technology & Innovation (DETI) initiative launched in the West of England to help drive a digitallyenabled recovery following the pandemic.

It is receiving £5 million from the West of England Combined Authority and is expected to deliver at least £62 million of added research and development value over five years.

And after just one year, the initiative has developed a visualisation tool that displays the carbon emissions of parts in manufacture in real-time, augmented reality that can detect faults quickly on in-service wind turbines and machine learning models that can capture and correct errors during the manufacture of an aircraft wing.

They all help manufacturers achieve better sustainability.

Chris Francis, CEO at Meech, said: “Our expansion demonstrates the growth of our business. It enables the teams to operate even more e ciently with one another and gives each of them the space they require to continue driving further expansion.

“We have seen substantial growth as a company over the years, and the new unit gives us a platform to continue developing our R&D resource to meet future demand.”

DETI has also revealed the successful trial of a digital system that monitors component build quality in realtime. Aimed at high-performance composites manufacture which must be cured in ovens, the system allows vital interventions to be made when it is impossible to visually monitor the build quality. In the aerospace, marine and automotive sectors that use this type of manufacturing technique heavily, this tool could improve sustainability and time to market substantially.

DETI is being delivered by the National Composites Centre at Emersons Green near Bristol in partnership with organisations including the Digital Catapult, University of the West of England and the University of Bristol. Industry partners include Airbus, GKN Aerospace, Rolls-Royce, and independent digital engineering research organisation CFMS.