How existing plants are becoming the mainstay of industrial transformation

How can the utilization, energy consumption and wear of real systems be reliably evaluated without replacing them? The article shows how modern measurement and data solutions make existing machines transparent and how retrofitting becomes a data-based efficiency and decision-making tool.

It's a familiar picture in many production companies: Early in the morning, the production manager walks through the production hall. The background noise is constant, almost soothing. Presses, machining centers and welding systems run in time with their programs, many of them for decades. Mechanically, they seem solid, well-rehearsed and reliable. And yet there is still some uncertainty on every tour. How high is the actual capacity utilization? Where are energy losses occurring? Which system is showing the first signs of wear before it comes to a standstill? What remains hidden to the eye and ear are the internal conditions of the machines. This is precisely where the tension between proven substance and growing pressure to innovate begins. Increasing demands for efficiency, transparency and documentation call for digital answers, while at the same time the economic reality speaks against a complete new acquisition. Against this backdrop, retrofitting is establishing itself as a technologically and economically viable modernization approach.