DENSO, a global manufacturer of automotive components, relies on the automation solutions from IPTE to drive efficiency and quality.
DENSO is a global company focused on advanced mobility that positively changes how the world moves and contributes to greater well-being. It’s a trusted Tier 1 automotive supplier providing thermal, powertrain, mobility, electrification and electronic systems to carmakers and other manufacturers around the world.
Established in 1949, DENSO has steadily expanded its global footprint, currently has 190 companies spread across 35 countries and regions. With a dedicated workforce of 164,572 individuals, DENSO continues to strengthen its position as a leading presence in the automotive industry worldwide.
In DENSO Barcelona, a team of around 1000 employees produces electronics & information & safety automotive components. This is done with the most up-to-date manufacturing technology befitting DENSO’s unique strength of Monozukuri (the art of making things).
Agustí Roy Puig
DENSO is fully committed to automation and digitization. As a result, there are continuous investments in all their facilities to convert manual production lines into MES connected, automated ones. “Automation offers many advantages. At DENSO, we are mainly looking at more efficiency for our production, a more qualitative product and finally a digital process follow-up,” starts Pere Roy Puig - Production Engineering M&T Assistant Manager.
For their latest project, a soldering line, IPTE was appointed to develop an efficient and flexible automation solution. High on the priority list were (1) a multi-product solution, (2) the ability to replicate the automation solution into other DENSO facilities and (3) conforming to the DENSO design specifications.
“IPTE was chosen from a list of preferred suppliers. Among them, IPTE stood out because they were very thoughtful from the quoting phase. Providing us with valuable feedback and even improvements to our specifications. As a result, their proposed automation solution fully met our top priorities,” says Agustí Roy Puig - Production Engineering Assistant Manager.
“IPTE not only met all our priorities. They excelled with a good technical and project approach. This combined with their experience in this type of process gave us confidence in their capabilities. In fact, within DENSO itself, there was a little experience with automated component pick & place and screwing. So we were looking for a supplier that could properly guide and even direct us toward a future-oriented automation solution,” adds Pere Roy Puig.
Pere Roy Puig
IPTE Spain is only 1.5 hours away from DENSO Barcelona, a major advantage during the design and development phase. The short distance allowed the project to be followed up closely in the first place. And, in the second place, enabled DENSO to effectively involve everyone who needed to be involved. “The physical proximity had a large positive impact on the cooperation between us and IPTE. It allowed us to be short on time for questions or problems that always arise at these stages,” says Agustí Roy Puig. “Hence, during our assessment process, this is also an important factor.”
“While physical proximity is an important factor in our assessment of our suppliers, a global presence is evenly important. After all, DENSO is a global company,” explains Pere Roy Puig. “And part of our global strategy is to replicate automation solutions to other production facilities as a global DENSO standard. A duplicate in fact takes away part of the development process which saves us time and money. It also limits our number of suppliers giving us fewer contacts. And finally, it allows us to build on the knowledge we already have through previous projects that served as tests.”
IPTE is well versed in this strategy. It is partly for this reason that IPTE is spread across 3 continents. In the case of DENSO, there were also previous projects, including for automated pick & place and screwing, initiated in Spain and meanwhile duplicated in the US.
Pere Roy Puig
Given the increasing number of electronics components in cars and a strategy focused on automation and digitalization, the path is clear for IPTE to develop more automation solutions for DENSO worldwide in the near future.
“With the successful implementation of this soldering line, IPTE has again proven itself as a valuable automation supplier within DENSO. Based on our experiences, it’s also more appropriate to refer to IPTE as an automation partner rather than merely a supplier," Pere Roy Puig concluded.
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