Phillips Tube Group, Inc.

Utilizing the KEYENCE RK automation tool, Phillips Tube Group has been able to operate more efficiently than ever before. Through automation, the team has been able to generate enhanced reports with data-driven insights, helping extract more productive, efficient solutions and enabling faster, more informed decision-making across their operations.

Prior to getting in touch with us, Marty had read about tools similar to robotic process automation (RPA) and computer automation but had never done serious investigation into them. Though he and Paden had identified several areas to incorporate an automation or productivity tool, they were struggling to find a solution that would meet all of their needs. After discovering KEYENCE RK and seeing a demonstration, Marty was excited about digital automation and the way the software licensing was structured.

RK differs from its competitors in that the tool offers a floating license. This meant there would be effectively no limit to the number of users who could access the software. The cost would not increase should more users be added or more automations be developed. RK would be easily scalable within their organization. This was vital as they wanted a program that would be accessible to different users and potentially different groups within the firm.

“The tool seemed very reasonable. We can create as many [automations] as we want and have a budget that we know is not going to change.”

Initially, the tool was adopted with the intention of automating two test cases, but it has grown into much more than that. Marty added that, “When I'm looking forward, we're talking about time savings initially, but some of it is also looking at things that have to get scheduled once a month that may be forgotten. But if we can schedule them, they won't be forgotten, and we can use the tool to do them.”

The tool has not solely helped with saving time by automating some of their mundane repetitive tasks but has offered them more time to add value elsewhere. He went on to say that “Some of them aren't that complicated, but it's just the fact that somebody has to remember. You know, the first day of the month we have to do it, or the first week of the month we have to do it. So, there is a huge advantage there.”

Every company is subject to limited resources, such as time or bandwidth. RK has been a huge advantage for the Phillips Tube Group by helping mitigate and even eliminate some of the problems they faced due to these limitations. The limitations that come with items as big as department-wide changes or minor IT fixes have become more efficient with the team’s implementation of RK. A prime example of this is with knowledge sharing across departments and teams.

“We're a smaller company, so we don't always have a lot of cross-training. So, if we have people that have a complicated process, we can take that complicated process and proceduralize it in the tool.”

By converting some of their complex, manual processes into automated workflows, the Phillips Tube Group has been able to standardize work and ensure consistency and accuracy every time. Standard operating procedures are great but being able to automate some of these routine activities has been crucial, especially for a company of this size where individual expertise is essential.

Marty shared that while there was a learning curve, the support from KEYENCE has been critical. The software license comes with a dedicated customer success representative employed full-time by KEYENCE whose sole objective is to teach users how to navigate the tool and help develop automations. When I prompted Marty to speak on his experience with our support team, he responded by saying,

“I think that's the premier thing I would talk about with regard to the tool. The support has been outstanding. We have a question, we e-mail it, and [our CS representative] comes back to us with a suggestion or an answer. They are very responsive.

Additionally, the tool was built with the end user in mind with the objective of anyone being able to use the tool effectively. Paden noted this in appreciation of RK saying,

“For me it's been great. Especially the user interface. I have used to use a lot of different software for automation, but they were all coding-based.”

The combination of user-friendly design and a dedicated support team has been vital to the success and implementation of RK into Phillips Tube Group’s processes. Marty finished by noting, “The tool stands out for that ready access to support and technical questions.”

At its core, the benefit of RK lies within the user and the automation of their work. It’s why the tool was developed with the end user in mind and why it aims to manage the more repetitive, monotonous tasks a user may have. While Phillips Tube Group has extracted a lot of value from the tool on the front end, some of the most beneficial aspects of RK adoption were not part of their initial justification.

“If you have the resources, it really applies to companies our size… we're very lean, and I know a lot of companies say that, but we don't have two people doing the same job throughout the company.”

The company’s agility is rooted in their employees’ most valuable asset being their individual expertise. Much of the value of RK is delivered by managing work that is reliant on a single individual or group and limited to that group’s command.

“We see it all the time when one person's been here for 20 years, so they know everything that there is to know. But there are no written work instructions, there's no backup, or full backup. There's just a lot of tribal knowledge that doesn't get documented. So, if you can take some of that tribal knowledge and roll it into a scenario, better yet.”

Transforming some of the individual expertise into reliable, accurate, automated processes has helped reduce some of the previous single points of failure for the Phillips Tube Group. By utilizing RK, not only are they more efficient but they have been able to increase operational resilience and have empowered themselves to scale efficiently without risking critical business processes.

There is so much that RK can do, and Marty and Paden aim to maximize that. While currently a two-person development team, they are actively onboarding a third employee to further scale automation efforts.

Their proactive approach includes engaging with department heads across the company to identify specific needs and potential applications for the tool. Despite the initial groundwork required to familiarize departments with RK's potential, this outreach has already yielded a significant volume of automation requests. Understanding where the tool fits and which processes will deliver the most return on investment is crucial.

Phillips Tube Group is just scratching the surface for what RK can do and will continue to add efficiency and productivity to their operations on top of the rewards they are already reaping. KEYENCE is Phillips Tube Group’s partner in bringing automation to the forefront of its work and is helping re-shape how they manufacture, manage, and operate their workforce.