News Bystronic achieves major milestone with first U.S. assembled BySmart Fiber laser cutting machine
By assembling laser cutting machines in the USA, Bystronic is further developing its market leading presence and operations network. Specifically, the BySmart Fiber 3015 laser cutting machine is the first machine to be locally produced in the three major market regions of the world; North America, Europe, and Asia, thus strengthening Bystronic’s global product availability and supply chain diversification.
Commitment to North America
The new BySmart Fiber will be shipped virtually fully assembled to most locations within North America. This process will reduce the installation time at the customer’s location by as much as 65%. Also, the machines will be 100% inspected and tested in the U.S. plant before shipment, which ensures that production will be up and running shortly after the installation is complete. Customer delivery lead times will also be reduced significantly.
The current plan is that from this fall 2020, the BySmart Fiber 4020 will also be assembled at the U.S. facility.
Lean manufacturing processes
From the very beginning, it was the goal of Bystronic to use the best practices from the manufacturing plants in Switzerland, Germany, and China in this new facility. The assembly area is laid out as a ‘lean flow’ line. Using this concept, the base machine frame starts at one end of the line, is assembled in stages, and the finished machine exits at the end of the line, much in the way cars are assembled. Components and sub-assemblies are brought to the production line in a “just in time” fashion to complete the machine.
Local sourcing
Bystronic will locally source machine components and sub-assemblies as economically practical. They have already identified suppliers for the mainframe, housing, dust tray, laser source and other components, and orders have already been placed with these vendors. Many of these vendors are current Bystronic customers and will be using Bystronic machinery to produce the parts.
Bystronic, Inc. production line
Hoffman Estates USA facility
The newly built Hoffman Estates facility will include a leading-edge Customer Experience Center and the headquarters for the Americas market region. It will serve as the hub for Bystronic U.S. business operations including sales, service, spare parts, and the refurbishing of used machinery.
Currently, Bystronic employs approximately 160 employees in the U.S., with a notable increase planned within this year and beyond as more products are added for U.S. assembly. The total area of the new building is 15,319 m2 (164,894 ft2), the total area for machine assembly and parts warehousing is 9,605 m2 (103,393 ft2), the Experience Center is 2,854 m2 (30,721 ft2) and a total office area of 2,859 m2 (30,780 ft2).
Experience Center and Bystronic smart factory
The vision of the smart factory is now a reality for customers of Bystronic. With its new Experience Center near Chicago, Bystronic is now demonstrating the future of sheet metal processing to customers in the U.S. Bystronic will be displaying its entire range of sheet metal processing solutions: the latest technologies for laser cutting, integrated automation and storage solutions, flexible bending systems, tube and profile processing solutions, a software landscape that covers the entire sheet metal processing chain, smart services, and offering customized live demonstrations for customers.
Vision becomes reality
What started as a vision back in 2018, has now come to fruition. The total investment for this project represents approximately 29m Swiss Francs (30m USD) and a firm commitment of the Swiss and globally active Bystronic Group to the North American market.
It’s often said that the best achievements are accomplished by those with a vision of the end result. Bystronic Inc. and Bystronic Manufacturing Americas are well on their way to achieving this initial vision.
A grand opening for the new Experience Center and headquarters for the Americas in Hoffman Estates, IL USA is scheduled for September 16 & 17, 2020.
Bystronic, Inc. Hoffman estates building