FACE TO FACE
North America is an important part of our business , representing 30 per cent of where we sell . Europe is still 40 % of our market and the rest is outside Europe . The Italian market is growing strongly but I see the greatest growth to come in the Middle East ( from structural steel markets etc .).
ISMR : Please explain your strategic and technical focus / vision over the next few years ?
CC : Laser is a strong technical focus for us , and a challenge . We already offer machines with laser-cutting capabilities .
From a strategic standpoint , we are developing new machines and technologies and getting closer and closer to our customers by opening subsidiaries in important markets . We are increasing our direct presence in North America . We just opened our subsidiary in Canada so now we can offer direct sales and service in the USA and Canada . We also opened a new subsidiary in Mumbai , India , this October with 16 people .
Japan is an important market for us and we have just increased the size of the company that we opened there seven years ago . We are putting a lot of effort into that market . Japan is the biggest consumer of steel per capita in the world ; it consumes six million tons per year ( structural steel construction ).
ISMR : What is your approach to technologies such as Artificial Intelligence ( AI )?
CC : We started a major AI project a few years ago . There are different ways of using AI so we started from the standpoint of the user experience ( not just the machine operator but all the stakeholders i . e . the maintenance guys , the owners , the service engineers etc .). When you design a machine that takes on all these personas , you need to understand how it will help them all to do their job properly , as well as collecting data from the machine so that the OEM can provide service to whoever has to use the asset .
This meant that we had to manage an entirely new digital innovation project . It was a success and we recently rolled out , to all our subsidiaries , a new service management software device that is the same platform we now use for sales and e-commerce . It collects a huge amount of data during an intervention for service support or training ( i . e . emails , photos , phone calls , video calls etc .). Collecting all this data in an intelligent manner , as well as data from machines , and then putting it all together can generate valuable troubleshooting help that is meaningful to whoever needs to use it .
This was a major project for us to undertake , with a lot of players , but it has created a new way of working for us . We chose key partners for the project and are now offering this feature to all our customers . It also obliged us to develop new sensors to collect data such as vibration , noise , temperature , quality of oil etc , so that we could add machinelearning algorithms and then generate data that is useful in the cloud from our service management solution . It ’ s a huge project that took a couple of years and we are now finishing the rollout to our customers .
A Ficep engineer .
ISMR : How are you handling sustainability in both your products and organisation ( including carbon footprint calculations etc .)?
CC : On the operational side , you must measure where you are consuming your energy and calculate your CO₂ footprint . We are currently halfway through a solar panel installation that should be finished by the middle of next year .
The Ficep team at EuroBLECH 2024 .
Ficep PLM software .
We are also adding monitoring devices to help us understand if certain types of jobs are more suited to night shift or day shift work , so that we can optimise our CO₂ footprint .
From a product perspective , we are adding IoT devices to our machines to help our customers . However , I believe that there should be help for European manufacturers to define an ‘ Eco label ’ for their products . If you can verify that your machine has been sustainably produced , then that machine should attract a premium . This would create a whole ecosystem of suppliers / supply chain that would be part of this measuring and monitoring initiative and could create a new way of making companies ‘ greener ’. It is a very ambitious project but it is important to create incentives in unstable times .
From a product standpoint , we can define the CO₂ impact of the machine while it is in operation and assign that to a single part . We can then apply 4D or 5D VIM modelling and use the 3D collaboration tool by colouring the objects in different colours , according to the CO₂ impact budgets provided to a customer .
We have also designed our machines to take account of key energy savings . Revolutionary machines , such as Ficep Direct Drive presses , are proof of this if you look at their power consumption and productivity performance .
ISMR : Thank you for your time . n
https :// ficepgroup . com
ISMR December 2024 / January 2025 | ismr . net | 23