- Expert Interview
Expert Interview: Digital Construction Site in Action
Digitalizing Construction
ANDRITZ has successfully started up a major pulp production mill for Bracell’s STAR project. The new plant in Lençóis Paulista uses the best technology in the industry.
For logistics and site management, ANDRITZ relies on Insite LMS , INSITE IT‘s platform for industrial construction sites. In this interview, Senior Site Manager Nogueira Itamar shares his insights into digitalizing construction projects using Insite LMS.
About Project STAR
Project Star is an ambitious Brazilian pulp and paper project by Bracell, for which ANDRITZ supplied Major Pulp Production equipment. The project is one of the largest and most sustainable pulp mills in the world and meets the highest environmental standards.
Project STAR features two environmentally friendly hardwood fiberlines for a capacity of 2.6 to 2.8 million tons/year of bleached kraft pulp or 1.5 million tons/year of dissolving pulp made from sustainably cultivated eucalyptus. These excellent results are based on the combination of customer and supplier partnership, good property management and technology, excellent planning & implementation.
»1,000 users, 90 companies, 2.7 million of data base modifications and 280,000 pictures, but Insite LMS provided us a way to proceed.«
Nogueira Itamar, Senior Site Manager, Group Site Installation ANDRITZ AG
1. You implemented the site management software Insite LMS for the first time in Brazil. For many, this seems to be a challenging task. What was your main motivation?
Nogueira Itamar: Our initial objective was to get material tracking via Insite LMS fully up and running in this project. We wanted to finish the implementation within six months - but did so in two! Seeing the success of this phase and experiencing Insite LMS and its simplicity in adapting management processes, we decided to extend the use of the site management solution to other areas such as HSE, quality, planning, commissioning and progress monitoring. When we saw that our external subcontractors were easily integrated into Insite LMS, we concluded that we could consolidate and simplify further routines via Insite LMS. And all this with the speed and security of data processing that we had been looking for! It was for sure a challenging task – 1,000 users, 90 companies, 2.7 million of data base modifications and 280,000 pictures, but Insite LMS provided us a way to proceed.
2. Besides using Insite LMS for the digital supply chain, the system became your project platform for progress monitoring, reporting, daily logs and deviations. What was your implementation strategy?
Nogueira Itamar: We believe that our staff should reach a state of fulfillment while doing their jobs. Chasing papers, big Excel files or numerous e-mails is not fulfilling at all! That‘s why we wanted something different. Nowadays everybody uses cell phones for chatting, taking photos etc. So why not bring the company‘s processes in the hands of the employee? We rigorously followed a „users first“ approach and a hands-on implementation. In this sense, we designed our Insite LMS processes in a mobile and customizable way to support each individual‘s needs. Doing so, everyone was easily brought on board. All in all, we saw that tremendous energy emerged within our project teams.
3. How did you convince your external subcontractors and customers to work directly on the platform?
Nogueira Itamar: If you provide a well-designed, tested, extremely lean and fast process, there is no need to convince external subcontractors and customers. When we introduced the site management software Insite LMS and trained our external users, they immediately started using it without any restrictions. Their feedback, of course, provided us with a valuable external perspective that led to adjustments that brought huge benefits to all our stakeholders. To sum up, I can say that Insite LMS is well-suited for our needs and our users appreciate the all-in-one app for accomplishing their respective tasks.
»Think about how you can optimize your processes and make them smarter, even if they already seem to work well. Insite LMS ideally supports us in doing so.«
Nogueira Itamar, Senior Site Manager, Group Site Installation ANDRITZ AG
4. What was the advantage of the rigorous hands-on approach you followed when implementing Insite LMS? What will you do differently in your next project?
Nogueira Itamar: The hands-on implementation worked well for us. All in all, we accomplished to make the processes useful for our users and to improve our processes. We reduced preparation time and eliminated excess and supply shortages. As INSITE IT is extremely experienced in site management, Insite LMS is well-suited for industrial construction projects. In our case, the site management software Insite LMS did not require a dedicated IT professional to deploy: We used the software‘s configuration flexibility to adapt it to our needs. All configuration was performed by a professional with on-site experience. Any support necessary was provided by INSITE IT. In our upcoming projects, we will extend the use of Insite LMS from the beginning of the project to the final phase, we will start the full integration of the entire production chain, and we will increase the global reach of Insite LMS by having our international departments interact with the site in real time. We have also seen that although Insite LMS has valuable training and documentation resources, it was beneficial for our users to adapt existing documentation to our company. As the number of users will increase significantly, we will develop video trainings on using Insite LMS according to our processes.
5. Site Management in Construction: Which three tips would you give to other companies that are now considering digitalizing their construction sites and introducing a site management software?
Nogueira Itamar:
- Listen to your users in their environment and configure Insite LMS directly on site.
- Think about how you can optimize your process and make it smarter, even if it already seems to work well.
- Share your findings with INSITE IT and work together to evolve your processes and software. This partnership has clearly been very good and mutually beneficial.
We thank Nogueira Itamar for the interview and the many years of successful cooperation.
About
Nogueira Itamar
Nogueira Itamar is a Global Senior Site Manager working for Group Site Installation at ANDRITZ in Graz, Austria. He holds postgraduate degrees in Business Law and Management (focus on process standardization) and has been with ANDRITZ for 16 years, working in various segments and on sites all over the world.
Andritz AG
ANDRITZ is a globally leading supplier of plants, equipment and services for hydropower stations, the pulp and paper industry, the metalworking and steel industries, and for solid/liquid separation in the municipal and industrial sectors as well as for animal feed and biomass pelleting.
Insite LMS: Site Management in Construction
Insite LMS was developed by INSITE IT, experts for site management and digitalization in industrial construction. The field-proven software has been successfully in use in projects around the globe for more than ten years now.
About the Author
INSITE IT GmbH
Since the company was founded in 2012, INSITE IT GmbH has continuously become the professional partner for plant engineers. The software company is headquartered in Linz (AT) and develops software solutions for materials, logistics and site management in plant engineering.
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