Benchmark in the Industry

Rethinking things from the ground up: a singular opportunity but also a massive challenge. Wilo has taken it on and built the Wilopark at the Group headquarters in Dortmund: a company campus with pump production structured according to new processes. Wilo has had the end customer in view since the very start of planning for the newly built factory. One of the challenges was manufacturing the distinctively broad pump program in a way that was efficient and to order. The goal was to significantly reduce process time and inventory. To achieve this, Wilo also wanted to make the production program less complex through consistent modernization. All the improvements have resulted in a significant increase in productivity.

With an average batch size of 1.8, extensive automation is not an option. That is why Wilo planned and built a smart factory where employees are comprehensively supported in attractive workplaces — in a flow production that is fully digitalized from the receipt of an order to the delivery of tailor-made pumps. For larger pumps, components are brought to workers via a driverless transport vehicle. Absolutely everything in the smart factory is new — except the experienced workforce and the products successful around the world. The significant degree of production depth also remains: Even the circuit boards for the pump controls are being built in the Wilopark, which also increases the flexibility of the smart factory.

For the planning stage of the smart factory, the Wilo production experts took their time — time well spent, as it turned out. The production concept developed with Porsche Consulting ensured that all expectations would be fully met. The figures back this up: Wilo was able to increase productivity by 30 percent and improve quality at the same time. This has seen warranty costs sink by over 40 percent. The smart factory is also a “lean” factory that is consistently geared toward fast delivery to the end customer. One other outcome: Wilo’s smart factory won the most renowned production competition in the German-speaking world and has been crowned Factory of the Year 2024.