NTF uses NX and Teamcenter to foster collaboration, access up-to-date product information and standardize processes
Since 1984, NTF Group Holding India has been a leading provider of innovative engineering solutions, renowned for its expertise in designing and manufacturing automotive interiors and exteriors. NTF supplies components to a wide range of vehicles across India via eight manufacturing plants with over 1,000 employees.
https://www.ntfholding.com/index.html
With NX and Teamcenter, NTF is fully prepared to handle even the most intricate projects, effortlessly managing volume, versatility and deadlines.
For over 15 years, NTF Group Holding India Pvt. Ltd. (NTF) leveraged Siemens Digital Industries Software solutions, particularly NX™ computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software, to effectively cater to clients across diverse sectors. However, amidst its ongoing expansion and diversification efforts, NTF faced hurdles in product development and manufacturing. In the fiercely competitive automotive industry, this includes an intensifying pressure to meet delivery deadlines. As the company expanded its facilities across multiple states in India to accommodate its increasing product portfolio, it became evident that traditional solutions were insufficient to address emerging challenges.
NTF’s processes were significantly more complicated with the absence of a product data management (PDM) or product lifecycle management (PLM) system. The company had all product-related information dispersed across various file-based systems or stored in hard copies, which made data retrieval and management challenging. Moreover, reliance on individual personnel led to workflow disruptions in the absence of key team members, making it difficult to track schedules and timelines, often resulting in missed deadlines or
errors due to human oversight.
As the company’s operations expanded, the multitude of software tools and fragmented information storage systems became increasingly burdensome. Relying on file-based storage exacerbated these challenges, as release management processes required additional effort and time-consuming searches, frequently resulting in errors.
Recognizing the rapid growth of the automotive industry and other sectors in India, NTF understood the need to enhance engineering information management to remain competitive in the market.
“In response to challenges across departments, particularly in data management, we explored PDM and PLM solutions,” says Pritam Prakash, assistant general manager (AGM) design and computer-aided engineering (CAE) at NTF. “Our goal was to streamline operations, enhance efficiency and meet customer demands with complete traceability. We sought an integrated
solution to oversee our design-to-manufacturing processes, centralize product data management and provide comprehensive project tracking and management capabilities.”
Originally, NTF believed achieving digital transformation would be challenging due to legacy work culture and multifunctional involvement. However, thanks to their partnership with DDSPLM, a Siemens partner, it transitioned smoothly with minimal downtime.
“Our partnership with DDSPLM has been instrumental in our pursuit of manufacturing excellence over the past 15 years,” says Prakash. “Whenever challenges arose, they provided invaluable guidance and support, offering innovative solutions that helped us overcome obstacles. Therefore, when we decided to undertake a comprehensive digital transformation, DDSPLM was the obvious choice for us.”
For this, the company’s management team decided to fully implement Teamcenter® software to bridge functional divides and streamline processes via a digital thread. Teamcenter and NX are part of the Siemens Xcelerator business platform of software, hardware and services.
Alongside DDSPLM, NTF’s dedicated team meticulously planned implementing Teamcenter using a comprehensive approach. “Fully leveraging the advantages of Teamcenter takes time since integrating all legacy and foundational processes across teams and seamlessly connecting with various departments is a challenging process,” says Prakash. “Nonetheless, we are pleased with the progress we’ve made and the results achieved thus far. Thanks to integrating Teamcenter, we eagerly anticipate even better outcomes in the days ahead.”
Fully integrating Teamcenter with NX allows NTF engineers to effortlessly bridge design and PDM. NX acts as the primary platform for creating, analyzing and sharing designs, supported by its robust CAD modeling capabilities. The close alignment between Teamcenter, NX and other engineering tools fosters a concurrent design environment, improving data organization, tracking and reuse. This eliminates redundant tasks, ensuring NTF meets cost and schedule goals.
Additionally, using Teamcenter streamlines managing multi-CAD data, regardless of the source system, empowering geographically dispersed teams to collaborate on parallel engineering efforts. This integration simplifies creating comprehensive bill-of-materials (BOM), enabling engineers to concentrate on refining designs without hinderance from information technology (IT) limitations. By adopting Teamcenter PLM, NTF boosted productivity by 35 percent via standardization, significantly reducing engineering change management time and minimizing late-stage revisions, driving substantial cost and time savings.
With a strong PLM foundation now in place, NTF is advancing its process efficiency and effectiveness strategy, positioning itself to address business challenges and achieve greater market success. Adopting Teamcenter represents a transformative shift in the company’s product development approach, streamlining processes and boosting competitiveness.
Instant access to parts data and enhanced quality control improve workflows, while built-in visualization tools enable rapid document review. This collaborative environment fosters innovation, and its reporting features provide stakeholders with real-time insights, ensuring better control over project outcomes.
“With NX and Teamcenter, NTF is fully prepared to handle even the most intricate projects, effortlessly managing volume, versatility and deadlines,” says Prakash. “Our customer-centric approach enables us to make informed decisions and consistently deliver superior products, thereby sustaining our global growth.”
Nonetheless, we are pleased with the progress we’ve made and the results achieved thus far. Thanks to integrating Teamcenter, we eagerly anticipate even better outcomes in the days ahead.