FT-Produktion is a machine shop servicing a wide range of customers, including carmakers, construction companies, and the furniture industry. Founded in 1983 and based in the town of Åseda in Southern Sweden, FT-Produktion has a diverse staff of 25 employees hailing from Sweden, Norway, Lithuania, Syria, and Thailand. Working in tandem with the neighboring company Profilgruppen, FT-Produktion supplies metal parts measuring up to 7.5 meters in size to a variety of industries.
The business transformation
In order to keep up with an increase in orders the company turned to a flexible collaborative robots – or cobots – solution to boost productivity without adding personnel. FT-Produktion now saves 500 hours when manufacturing a series of 150,000 parts. The new technology also elevated job satisfaction by bringing variation to daily routines – a key advantage in an industry battling to attract and retain qualified labor.
When FT-Produktion was approached by big industry players such as Volvo, Renault and Scania with big order requests, the company knew no machine shop in its right mind would want to turn down orders of this magnitude – even if it meant pushing capacity and productivity to the limit. But in a labor market where recruiting qualified employees is easier said than done, it takes innovation to increase output capacity.