Integrating five global sites enables world-class product development

FMC Technologies, Inc.

At FMC Technologies Energy Systems, design work is done at five global sites, with each site benefiting from the work of the others

• Management focus at FMC Technologies Energy Systems is aimed at providing individualized solutions to customers while controlling the amount of engineering time spent on each project.

Comprehensive energy solutions – designed globally

FMC Technologies, Inc. is a global leader providing mission-critical technology solutions for the energy, food processing and air transportation industries. The company designs, manufactures and services technologically sophisticated systems and products for its customers through its Energy Systems (comprising Energy Production Systems and Energy Processing Systems), FoodTech and Airport Systems businesses.

The Energy Systems business provides comprehensive solutions for energy producers. “We make everything that’s needed to take oil and gas out of the ground and transfer it back to the refinery,” explains Steve Joiner, integrated product development (IPD) manager at FMC Technologies Energy Systems. Energy Systems is truly a global operation. Unlike some companies that design from a single location and then manufacture offshore, this company does design work at five globally diverse facilities, located in Texas, Singapore, France, Norway and Scotland. “Each site is a center of excellence for one of our product lines,” says Joiner. “We design and manufacture at all five locations.”

Boosting engineering productivity

Management focus at FMC Technologies Energy Systems is aimed at providing customized solutions while minimizing the number of engineering hours devoted to each project. “Reducing engineering hours is big focus of management,” says Joiner. “It’s critical for profitability and for speeding time-to-market.” One key strategy for achieving this is re-use of existing product information. This is the goal within each individual facility but also enterprise-wide. “In the past, we had the capability of managing product information at each site, but we didn’t have very good visibility to the global picture of who was doing what,” says Joiner. “That is what we needed if we were really going to leverage product information across the enterprise.”

Energy Systems chose Teamcenter® digital lifecycle management software to address its global product development needs. “The most important benefit of Teamcenter is that it allowed us to go global,” Joiner says. Energy Systems has gone “well beyond CAD data management” with Teamcenter, according to Joiner. All product information (NX® and other CAD data, material specifications, coding specifications, design documentation, quality data, manufacturing data, tooling test fixtures and so on) is stored and managed within Teamcenter. This is the case at all of the five sites.

Teamcenter is also used to manage workflows such as how information is reviewed and released. When data from one of the sites is released, it then becomes available to other sites as part of the release cycle. “Without Teamcenter, we could export an entire database to another facility, but we would have no control over what we supplied to the other sites,” Joiner explains. “Using Teamcenter we can send out data on an item-by-item basis and share that information very concisely.” Teamcenter manages workflows identically at all five sites, ensuring consistency across the enterprise.

PLM process improvements support growth, regulatory compliance

The scope of Energy Systems’ solutions has expanded dramatically in recent years. In the past, the business supplied point solutions such as oil and gas wellheads. Now its solution range is much broader, covering a great deal of the energy extraction and transport process. The enhanced engineering efficiency brought about by Teamcenter has supported this growth. “With the ability to re-use product data from the different design centers, we are executing more projects without a corresponding increase in personnel,” Joiner says.

Another area where Teamcenter plays a critical role is regulatory compliance. In the oil and gas business, there are numerous regulatory agencies that dictate everything from product design to environmental issues at the job sites. Teamcenter is helpful here because it ensures that all engineering documentation is managed according to regulations. For example, the system has been set up to limit access to information to authorized users only, a requirement of all regulatory agencies. Teamcenter also helps ensure that during manufacturing, parts are built to the correct specifications. “When we design a part in our system, we determine what specification we must certify that part to,” says Joiner. “When we make the part, it is constructed against the requirements that engineers placed against those parts. Manufacturing personnel can easily determine the version of a specification the part will be audited to.”

Since implementing Teamcenter, FMC Technologies Energy Systems has been achieving its goal of reducing engineering hours. By giving the company a product information infrastructure that permits the re-use of design expertise from around the world, Teamcenter helps bring the efficiency necessary to thrive in the highly competitive, tightly regulated energy industry.

Links relacionados:

• FMC Technologies, Inc.

Cambios:

• Enhance profitability and speed time-to-market by reducing engineering hours
• Create infrastructure that supports expansion of products and services
• Ensure compliance in tightly regulated energy industry

Claves de Éxito:

• Leverage the work of five global design centers by facilitating the sharing of product information
• Control data storage and release processes to permit company-wide information re-use
• Ensure regulatory compliance with advanced data management practices

Resultados:

• Fewer engineering hours per project permits growth in products and services without headcount increase
• Product documentation meets requirements of international regulatory agencies
• Greater engineering efficiency keeps costs down and speeds development

Industria:

• Aerospace & Defense
• Consumer Products & Retail
• Energy & Utilities

Actividad Principal del Cliente :

FMC Technologies, Inc. is a global leader in solutions for the energy, food processing and air transportation industries.

Visita Website

Sector:

• Production Efficiency
• Regulatory Compliance

Soluciones/Servicios:

• NX
• Teamcenter

Localización del cliente:

Houston, Texas
United States

"The most important benefit of Teamcenter is that it allowed us to go global."

Steve Joiner

Integrated Product Development Manager

FMC Technologies, Inc