The Lean improvement method distinguishes eight waste categories. One of these is 'inventory'. Too much stock is not good, but neither is too little. After all, having stock also provides the safe feeling of availability in times of uncertain internal planning and external factors that cannot be directly influenced. Because optimising availability both in one's own company and in the supply chain is often not the core competence of our customers, itsme can take over the care of such optimisation, for example through the import and management of so-called Vendor Managed Inventory systems. But, how do you know whether VMI is indeed the right solution? Ralph van Aartsen can answer that crucial question - using five questions. Here, in advance, are his answers to our questions on VMI.

For years, itsme has supplied signal cables to Krohne Altometer, producer of flow meters for the process industry, among other things. Cut to size and delivered on time, although the latter is a challenge these days due to delivery problems in global supply chains. "In itsme we have a good party, which thinks along and helps where it can. Just a very reliable supplier, who says what they do and does what they say." Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

Climate control is in hot demand, as they experience every day at Rensen, specialist in measurement and control technology for building automation. Despite continued price increases, sales and execution are under pressure. The component shortage that emerged last year only increases the challenge of completing projects on time. itsme supports this by monitoring delivery times from the start of a project, finding alternatives if necessary and optimising inventory management. “I’m here almost every week now.”

When it comes to developing and building traffic control installations (VRIs), Ko Hartog Verkeerstechniek is a good acquaintance of the Directorate-General for Public Works and Water Management and of municipal and provincial highway authorities in the Netherlands. For a number of years now, companies in England have also been finding their way to Heerhugowaard. What started as a test, has grown into a huge success. itsme was involved in that development from the very beginning.

Although the provisioning of care homes is often well organised, on the flip side there is sometimes still room for improvement, especially where hygiene processes are concerned. With that in mind, Jop van Haaren, director and owner of Less2Care from Raalte, set out to work ten years ago. The result? The VacuSan: an automated solution for the safe vacuum sealing and disposal of used incontinence materials. The electronic parts of the operating system are delivered as a kit – a customer-specific package – by itsme. “As a customer you don’t need to worry about it anymore.”

eReM provided complete electrical installation for new shipyard in Kenya Sometimes a project seems to have been arranged from front to back. But what if you are asked at the very last minute to show what your company is capable of? At eReM in Zwijndrecht, the Netherlands, they know all about it. In part thanks to a rock-solid offer they convinced their end customer – an internationally operating Dutch shipbuilder – to come on board with them. And in this case literally because, as it concerned the installation of the entire electrical system of a new shipyard in Kenya, the components were shipped by sea freight. Their main challenge? In the preliminary phase everything had to be 100% correct. This required thorough preparation in which eReM could count on support from itsme.

TES Industrial Systems about innovating and collaborating At TES Industrial systems, all expertise in electrotechnical drive technology is gathered under one roof: from assembly, engineering and panel building to commissioning, service and after sales. But what drives the organisation itself? “We are forward-looking. But with respect for the past.” TES Industrial Systems and itsme about the strength of collaboration.

How does an organisation ensure the transition from start-up to scale-up to go smoothly? For fast-growing Kind Technologies the answer partly lay in scalability: not only growing fast, but above all efficiently and smartly. Together with Rittal and itsme they took a closer look at the production process of their enclosures. By partially outsourcing the assembly work, the lead time has been reduced from four weeks to just one week.

Headquartered in Sint-Truiden, Belgium, with production lines in Germany, Mexico, China and Romania, VCST is one of the world’s largest manufacturers and suppliers for the automotive industry. It is part of the Belgian BMT Group, with business in various industries, in all corners of the world.

A few years ago, CSi decided to make the switch to stockless production in order to increase its Return on Investment. CSi can realise this with the help of the Integrated Logistic Supplier project, which consists of four focus areas: appoint a Key Supplier, apply product alignment, automate data traffic and set up a VMI system.

Verstegen has laid down its sustainability goals in the Sustainable Values. The goal is for all internal processes to be CO2 neutral by 2020. Verstegen starts with matters such as the use of second-hand office furniture and reusing office materials for example. Circular purchasing on a technical level has proven to be more challenging than expected..

The row of course binders at his home looks impressive. Even more so when you take into consideration that they don’t even include all of the training courses he has undertaken at itsme Industrial Automation. As many as seventeen, in just over three years. Quite a few, Mehmet thinks, but pretty logical in his opinion. “I get a lot out of the itsme training courses.”

We automate your success, that is the slogan of Manders Automation. And that is exactly what the specialist builder from Venray does. The company makes unique installations as a solution for specific applications at the customer. It is almost a specialty in itself, that special construction. Also supported by a long-standing cooperation with itsme.