The globally active LiSEC Group uses costing24 to calculate the manufacturing costs of components for its flat glass processing machines and systems. The switch to the cloud solution from simus systems makes future costs visible earlier and with greater accuracy – without the need for installation, licenses, or maintenance.
“In mechanical and plant engineering, price is a decisive factor. Approximately 70 to 80 percent of manufacturing costs are determined as early as the development phase,” says Georg Kropf, who has been with the LiSEC Group since 2019. For 60 years, LiSEC has been offering machines and automation solutions for the processing and finishing of flat glass. In Seitenstetten, in the Amstetten district of Lower Austria, approximately 950 of the company’s 1,300 global employees develop and manufacture individual machines and production lines for insulating and laminated glass, glass edge processing machines, glass cutting systems, logistics systems, and software for the flat glass industry. Product development focuses on innovation – as evidenced by 330 patents – as well as the robustness and durability, quality, and efficiency of the systems. Georg Kropf oversees cost-related matters from prototyping through to series production handover. “Even during product maintenance or in collaboration with purchasing, I analyze cost structures, discuss component machining steps, or determine assembly costs to ensure transparency,” he says.
LiSEC offers not only individual machines and software but also complete production lines, including automation technology, that can be seamlessly integrated.
The costs are clearly broken down by setup and processing times.
After spending his first year familiarizing himself with the existing machinery, manufacturing processes, equipment, and tools in his costing projects, Georg Kropf began to question the high level of manual effort involved in working with spreadsheets and started looking for alternatives: “While searching online, I came across costing24 from simus systems,” he recalls. The cloud solution can be easily tested without any installation effort or time commitment: “I immediately liked the logical structure and ease of use.” To perform a cost estimate, you upload the 3D file of a component. Based on the component geometry and the defined details, the necessary machining technologies and work sequences are automatically determined, and a preliminary cost estimate is generated. Machine data, cycle times, markups, and much more can be customized. Georg Kropf explains: “I particularly like the clear breakdown of costs, categorized by setup and processing times for different batch sizes. I can export the results and aggregate them into system costs in our PLM portal.”
Data security is a top priority at LiSEC. That is why it was important that costing24 be developed in Karlsruhe and hosted on a server in Germany. After analysis, the native 3D models are saved exclusively in the simus proprietary S3D format. The original data is not retained and cannot fall into the wrong hands. Georg Kropf explains: “The high level of security was the deciding factor. Since there’s no installation or maintenance involved, I didn’t need any IT support either. You pay a monthly fee for the service and aren’t locked into a long-term contract. That’s what made the decision easier.”
In the cloud application, you can customize many cost parameters – such as markups, hourly rates, or feed rates – and even factor in location-specific cost rates. “However, we’ve hardly made use of this feature because we’re more interested in a representative market comparison than in actual purchase prices,” says Georg Kropf. “We’ve only uploaded our extensive material database, which we update ourselves.”
“The high level of security was the deciding factor. Since there’s no installation or maintenance involved, I didn’t need any IT support either. You pay a monthly fee for the service and aren’t locked into a long-term contract. That’s what made the decision easier.”
Georg Kropf, Costing Specialist at LiSEC
“I act as a human interface to ensure cost transparency for everyone involved. Compared to the previous method of using spreadsheets, transparency has increased significantly.”
Since then, the specialist has costed several hundred components. Requests come from current product development, from design engineers working on product maintenance, and also from the purchasing department. “I act as a human interface to ensure cost transparency for everyone involved. Compared to the previous method of using spreadsheets, transparency has increased significantly,” explains Georg Kropf. Depending on the order situation, LiSEC adjusts the balance between in-house production and outsourcing to preferred suppliers. “If in-house production isn’t cost-effective and the quality is right, we outsource parts.” The cost reports from costing24 serve as a basis for discussion with both the company’s own development and production teams as well as with suppliers. Based on STEP models and component costs, bottom-up calculations for entire assemblies are generated by transferring the data to the internal PLM portal.
costing24 is more than capable of handling the special-purpose machine builder’s wide range of manufacturing capabilities: in addition to turning, milling, and drilling, as well as sheet metal and bending operations, it also covers 3D printing, welding, and a wide range of finishing processes. The solution is constantly being improved: “I can now also calculate tube laser cutting. The program thus covers over 90 percent of our machining processes,” says Georg Kropf pleased. This is important to LiSEC, as technological progress continues unabated. For example, shaped tubes have recently begun to be folded so that they can be welded using tube lasers without the need for scoring. “It would be great if this advancement were soon incorporated into costing24 as well,” says Kropf.
Cost parameters can be customized on the costing24 calculation platform.
“This tool is a huge help to us in our transparent cost monitoring.”
“The value for money and the minimal effort required are hard to beat.”
So far, the costing specialist has been very satisfied with both the speed of development and the service provided by simus systems. “Whenever we encountered issues with the application, I received prompt responses from very friendly and helpful staff – just as we strive to serve our own customers.”
The scope of services also meets our requirements. “This tool is a huge help to us in our transparent cost monitoring,” says Georg Kropf. “For individual machining operations, costing24 doesn’t go into as much detail as the quoting software used by specialized contract manufacturers.” But Georg Kropf doesn’t compare his results to those anyway: “For our critical parts, we rely on long-term partnerships within a clearly structured supplier network that we can count on.”
Georg Kropf is currently so satisfied with costing24 that other costing tools are out of the question: “The value for money and the minimal effort required are hard to beat.”
