Inovation Centre Welcomes 1,000th Visitor

Phil Black - PII Editor 19/01/2015

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With a standard product range including more than 12,000 standard items, well over half a million variations and around 40 new or revised solutions launched every year, devising an effective way to display a key selection of products could prove problematical. But pneumatics market leader SMC solved the problem in style with its state-of-the-art Innovations Centre at their UK headquarters in Milton Keynes. Now the facility is about to welcome its 1,000th visitor, less than three years after opening.

The Innovations Centre displays a range of solutions according to the industrial sectors where they are most commonly found, with examples of real-life applications. Recently-launched products are given their own individual emphasis, and an entire section of the Centre is reserved to highlight bespoke solutions, complete with customer testimonies.

Visitors to SMC can also see how the company applies lean manufacturing processes during a guided tour of their production facility. One of 34 manufacturing centres owned by the corporation worldwide, SMC’s UK factory produces engineered special product variations, and the tour illustrates how customers benefit from practical application of the “Five S” lean manufacturing philosophies – as well as one practice that SMC has in common with global online retailer Amazon!

SMC UK’s Marketing Manager, Bob Hitner, explained: “Our customers can come to the Innovations Centre and actually pick up parts they’re interested in, to get a feel of how they might fit into a machine or application. Many of our solutions are designed to be suitable where space is an issue, so being able to see the product before you commit to buy – rather than just see it in a catalogue or technical drawings – is a real benefit.

“Many of the displays are dynamic, so customers can see for themselves how effective our blow guns and cyclone grippers are, to use just a couple of examples.

“When we relaunched the Innovations Centre we could never have imagined just how popular it would be, so now we’re looking forward to welcoming our next thousand visitors!”