CASE STUDY HOW ROBOTIC AUTOMATION SUPPORTS NEW LINES OF BUSINESS Showa Co. Ltd., a Japanese industrial washer and dishwasher manufacturer, began production of face masks in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Problems Initially, their mask manufacturing process: involved a lot of manual work, resulting in long lead times, excessive in-process inventory and frequent product defects; the initial production capacity was 1.5 million masks per month, but the number of orders exceeded 2 million per month. In order to meet the demand, their production process needed to be upgraded drastically. Solution In order to increase production capacity, it was necessary: to fully automate the entire production process from mask manufacturing to O 8 R D W S inspection, packaging, and packing for shipment, and to minimise manual work; to define the process which involved cutting, layering, and folding the unwoven fabric, attaching a nose-fitting wire and ear straps, adding inspection by camera for defects, wrapping masks individually in plastic, then packing each lot in boxes. By introducing high speed picking robots Kawasaki Y series in the entire process, the company: achieved a production capacity of 2 to 3 million masks per month; drastically reduced the number of workers for material handling from 10 to 1. Since then, the company has made further improvements, and it can now produce more than 9 million masks per month. The robots are active on the mask production line 24 hours a day: as a result, this solution has significantly improved efficiency, speed and accuracy. Complete the sentences with the words given below. automate camera COVID-19 pandemic defects demand face masks lead times nine million shipment Y series inventory: scorte di magazzino lead time: tempo d esecuzione unwoven fabric: tessuto non tessuto 1. Along with industrial washers and dishwashers, Showa CO. Ltd. introduced the production of .................................................... 2. The company started their face mask production in 2020 because of the .................................................... 3. Initially, the manual production resulted in long .................................................... 4. Manual work involved frequent product .................................................... 5. The company s initial production was insufficient to meet the market .................................................... 6. To increase the face mask production, the company decided to fully ................................................... the entire production process. 7. The robots perform manufacturing production, inspection, packaging and packing for ............................................ . 8. The inspection to detect defects in the pieces is carried out by a .................................................... 9. Now the company has a monthly production of more than ................................................... masks. 10. The high-speed picking robots employed are Kawasaki .................................................... MECHATRONICS 159 MechPower.indb 159 30/01/24 17:08