A Message from PCA Associate Member Ramco
Business performance in the cement industry is heavily dependent on optimal plant performance. A common challenge faced by cement producers is the lack of comprehensive visibility of plant operations at the leadership level. While cement manufacturers may have invested in ERP and automation systems, they are typically unable to realize the full value due to the lack of real integrated data. Cement plants are equipped with control system to run the plant, which is often delinked from ERP systems that propel the overall business. As a result, plant data must be manually ported into documents, collated, and analyzed by the decision-makers. Being a manual and deferred process, it causes inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and delays. In addition, lack of predictive models impairs the capability to forecast key business parameters for decision-making in real-time.
To address the challenge, cement producers need to have a 'Smart Plant' solution. It is bound to address challenges arising out of the disconnect between plant operations and corporate strategy. An ideal solution such as Ramco Smart Plant should have specifically curated modules and functions to carry out business processes at a plant level and integrate it with business operations. It includes raw material receipts through storage, production planning, manufacturing of finished goods, plant asset management and logistics management. These functions are seamlessly integrated and the connectors to plant data are built in along with performance dashboards. They must be tightly integrated with ERP functions such as HR, Finance, Procurement and Sales.
Digital Transformation involves interventions across three levels:
- Improving plant performance by optimization of process departments such as mills and pyro to achieve higher and consistent performance. It results in savings in specific power, specific fuel and quality improvement.
- Making the plant smarter in true sense by having a comprehensive plant operations visibility. It provides a 360-degree view into inventory, procurement, production levels, logistics, quality, maintenance, HSE compliance, and the entire plant data.
- Infusing plant insights into business functions such as Finance, Procurement, Sales at a corporate level to ensure informed decision-making at corporate level.
Through digital transformation, cement producers stand to reap the following business benefits:
- Reduction in specific power
- Reduction in specific fuel
- Support increase in production
- Improved decision-making with real-time metrics and role-based dashboards
- Improved productivity with greater visibility and more automated back-office processes
- Higher customer satisfaction through real-time inventory and logistics management
- Optimized operations through integrated financial management and business intelligence
- Accountability and compliance with robust, auditable accounting