Sovelia automates product data management processes and saves engineers’ time in Viking Life-Saving Equipment

Viking Life-Saving Equipment A/S provides solutions to protect passengers and crew at sea, whether it is on cruise liners, cargo ships or offshore platforms. Viking produces lifesaving equipment to protect people and ensure safety and regulatory compliance on board. The company is headquartered in Denmark with 8 production facilities, over 85 branch offices and 3000 employees around the world.

The need for standardized CAD data and uniform metadata

Viking has a long cooperation with Symetri. Already back in 2013 Viking (at that time Norsafe) realized that they needed to standardize their CAD data and make metadata more uniform.

Symetri initiated the project by analyzing the CAD data from Inventor and developing a property matrix to determine the placement of metadata. The goal was to eliminate the retyping of data by setting up Sovelia Inventor to automate metadata input through dropdown lists, automatic measurements, and property transfers from models to drawings. This setup allowed for efficient import/export of item numbers and corresponding data from the ERP system, removing manual and duplicate data entry and misplaced information.

Impressive ROI and time savings with metadata automation

In addition to automating metadata input with Sovelia Inventor, a significant focus was on training to ensure a uniform workflow across the company. The initial step was presented to Viking management, revealing an impressive ROI even with conservative calculations. With 40 CAD users generating about 10,000 new files monthly by copy design or basic modeling, the time savings exceeded initial estimates, with a potential saving of 1.5 minutes per file. The users at Viking actually stated, that in reality, the time saving is even bigger than the calculation.

Time-saving ROI

• 10,000 new files per month
• Time-saving with Sovelia Inventor: 1,5 minutes per file
• Total time-saving: 10,000 * 1,5 minutes = 15,000 minutes per month (250 hours per month of engineer work)

Achieving uniform metadata and reducing manual work

Viking decided to implement Sovelia Inventor and Sovelia Vault while rolling out the new version of Autodesk software. The implementation included thorough training and documentation, ensuring a seamless transition on the day of the upgrade. The new setup not only ensured a correct ERP BOM but also saved considerable time for engineers through automation.

The original goal of uniform metadata and less manual and repetitive work was accomplished. Sovelia Inventor makes sure that the metadata is correct and added to the right properties with less manual work.

Tore Marstein, Global CAD Manager at Viking says that they had a challenge of creating secondary documents manually which were not always in the release state. With Sovelia Vault that challenge is now solved. Viking wanted to secure and simplify the use of correct, approved PDFs from Vault and ensure the use of correct BOM data from released files. With Sovelia Vault there is no longer a revision mismatch between the state of the original file and the secondary document. Engineers save a lot of time with the automated process and don’t need to remember to go through multiple manual steps.

"Thanks to Sovelia Vault we were able to automate product data management processes and free up engineers’ time for other tasks.” Tore Marstein, Global CAD Manager at Viking Life-Saving Equipment

Merger required integrating workflows and systems

In 2019 Viking acquired Norsafe, leading to a merger that required integrating workflows and systems. At that time Viking was using SAP as the product data management system with Solidworks but they decided to transition to Autodesk products with Sovelia solutions. Again, Symetri embarked on a project to create a unified system for the merged companies. The strategy involved migrating SolidWorks data into Autodesk Vault and adopting Inventor and Vault for future use.

Symetri developed training materials, conducted training sessions, and implemented the necessary software and workflows, enabling Viking to train their personnel and maintain the systems. Together with Viking Symetri also integrated Vault servers into the Viking domain and used CQi for software installation and maintenance. Additionally, Symetri facilitated SAP integration using standard Sovelia solutions, along with custom actions for Viking DWG files. The feedback from Viking indicated that Autodesk Inventor provided greater stability compared to SolidWorks, and the combined use of Autodesk Vault and Sovelia Vault with Sovelia Inventor resulted in a more efficient workflow. The enhancements included improved functionality and effective workflows, integrating SAP metadata, importing SolidWorks data into Vault, and utilizing custom actions to meet specific needs.

Ongoing success and future plans with Sovelia Vault

Overall, the collaboration between Viking and Symetri has led to significant improvements in product data management, workflow efficiency, and system integration, paving the way for continued success and growth.

Looking ahead, Sovelia Vault remains a key component in the long-term strategy of Viking as they explore system expansion. “Sovelia Vault is a valuable tool that is easy to configure and maintain,” recommends Tore Marstein. “Cooperation with Symetri has been seamless, it has been easy to get custom jobs created and we have been working as a team,” Marstein concludes.