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Automotive Industry

Five minutes with: Dennis Cocco, president and chief executive of EMT makers of Visual Plant - The Supply Side - Interview

Automotive Industries, Oct, 2002 by Andrea Wielgat

Executive Manufacturing Technologies (EMT) has a novel idea. Give plant managers, floor managers and even maintenance people all the information they need and they'll make better decisions regarding their plant. Those decisions will lead to efficiency gains which will eventually help companies cut costs.

One way to do this is with EMT's Visual Plant software, says Dennis Cocco, president and CEO of EMT. Cocco sat down with Automotive Industries and explained why his software can benefit both automakers and suppliers.

Q. WHAT IS VISUAL PLANT AND WHAT DOES IT DO?

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A. Visual Plant is a web-based plant floor production monitoring application designed to integrate all activities on the plant floor to provide visibility for upper management and other business systems on every activity within the production facility.

Q. WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF VISUAL PLANT?

A. It is a true off-the-shelf offering. It simplifies the complexity of trying to understand what's happening in their production facilities and turn it into information on which they can manage their facilities They will make better decisions on cuffing costs, improving efficiencies, reducing their scraps and generally get a better handle on the operations of their facilities.

Q. HOW CAN YOU HELP CUT COSTS DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY?

A. It is somewhat indirect in that providing people with the metrics upon which they can make better decisions generally results in efficiency gains. Most of our customers, prior to having a product like Visual Plant, have been somewhat in the dark and operating more on gut feel and instinct. With the introduction of our product they now have a better handle and more control over their decision making. Programs such as Six Sigma and lean manufacturing become much more effective because there is a base of solid information upon which to work from.

Q. HOW QUICKLY CAN YOU HELP SHOW RESULTS?

A. Three to six weeks will get the software implemented and we're showing paybacks of three to six months on those implementations.

Q. WHO IN THE PLANT USES THE SOFTWARE?

A. The interesting thing is that our product touches so many people in the organization from maintenance to engineering to production to quality people and plant management. They will take the summarized information that's aggregated from all departments and generally focus on the key performance indictors on how their facility is doing.

Automotive Industry

Five minutes with: Dennis Cocco, president and chief executive of EMT makers of Visual Plant - The Supply Side - Interview

Automotive Industries, Oct, 2002 by Andrea Wielgat

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