On December 16, the fifth knowledge circle of the Innovatiecluster Drachten started under the name Manufacturing Engineering. This profession has been neglected in the Netherlands in recent years, but is now receiving a lot of attention again due to the Smart Industries initiative of the High Tech Systems. Various ICD companies have shown great interest in talking with colleagues about setting up a production strategy. , introducing manufacturability, new factory layouts and new production technologies.

The first session was introduced by Ben Geerts of Fokker Aerostructurese. He has led the Smart Factory project within his company. Ben presented the results of the use of digital production data and smart sensors based on production. In the sense of reduction of production errors, acceleration of lead time and more efficient production, resounding results have been achieved here.

After this presentation, the knowledge circle set up the agenda for 2015, in which four moments were selected at four different companies.