Day 4…..Voith Manufacturing Facility

May 18, 2017

We left Grand Central Hotel in Shanghai at 8:20am to go to the “small town” of Kunshan with only 2 million people. Steve told us that the town was predominately immigrant workers, which are known in China as “floating people.” On the way out of Shanghai, we passed the people’s park, which Steve referred to, as a marriage market. Fathers will go to that park with pictures and descriptions of their daughters after they reach the age of 30 in order to find husbands for them. It is common in Chinese culture for parents to be involved in the process of finding a husband or wife for their child. It is also common for the bride and groom to dress in their wedding clothes before their wedding day to take pictures.

Most people in China, who are religious, are Buddhist, but less than 30% of the people are religious due to the Cultural Revolution. During this period, many temples were rebuilt because they were burned down by those who wanted the country to be “pure” by getting rid of the old way of life. Buddhism is based on the principle of eliminating the 108 forms of suffering. We learned that there are two types of Buddhism, Tibetan and Chinese, and that the Buddhist people do not pray to Gods but look to monks and Buddha to reduce their suffering.

Voith Warmly Opens Their Doors

We arrived at the Voith facility around 10 AM where we were warmly greeted with refreshments and snacks.  It was a beautiful, state-of-the art facility.  We began the tour with a presentation from Daniel Weiss, a Voith VP.  He spoke about the company and location history, and he introduced us to the markets which Voith supplies (digital solutions, hydro, turbo, and paper).  He informed us about the company statistics, including years of operation, number of countries, employees, and financial statistics.  In the paper business line, he described the projects, products and services, fabric services, and roll systems; all of these divisions are located at the facility.  The Kunshan Facility, the Asian Voith Headquarters, was established in 1994 and employees 1,222 people.  It has delivered 83 machines in China since 1994, and has a capacity of around eight set machines per year.  Kurt Yu, the VP of sales, elaborated on the paper division of Voith.  His vision is to use a control system to prevent paper breaks before they happen.  He also set some goals in an adapting industry; less than one liter of water per kilogram of product, reduce energy by half, and maximize the recycle rate were the three major goals of Voith.  Rose Gu, the quality manager, introduced the company’s operation excellence strategy.  The OPEX strategy involves four steps: the vision or approach, the four principles, nine wastes, and nine elements.  The four principles highlight customer focus, flow, stability and robust processes, and synchronized production.  Due to our process-engineering course taught at NC State, introducing similar concepts, there was a lot of student involvement and questions during this discussion.  Next, we were introduced to a Nanjing Forestry University student who completed his master’s program at NCSU.  He began his career at the Kunshan facility.

Networking Opportunity with Voith Management & Employees

The box lunch we were provided was delicious and we were allowed to interact and network with Voith management and employees.  After lunch, we were given a brief safety training, and then provided with the proper protective equipment.  The facility provides a three-year vocational education-training lab for technicians.  We toured the training facilities on pumps, welding, and milling.  We divided into groups and went to the four areas.  My group started at the products and services area.  The area goes through a process of welding, milling, marking, storage, sand blasting, and painting in order to create the carbon and stainless steel products that are created on-site.  The projects area is where machines are pre-assembled.  All imported and site-created products are put together to ensure proper delivery.  The facility was currently assembling two machines.  It was an incredible sight.

Nanjing….here we come

After visiting Voith, we took the bus to Nanjing. Nanjing means South Capital while Beijing means North Capital. This is because Nanjing was the capital city for six dynasties and is now a town of 10 million. China did not have concrete so they used sticky rice to hold the city is surrounding wall together and it has been standing since the Ming Dynasty. To ensure good quality of the wall, the engineers and workers put their names on each brick and section of the wall that they worked on. If something went wrong, the Emperor would have the responsible party, and their family killed. It is rumored, that if the workers were killed they would be put into the wall.

by guest blogger Bradley Cooper & Hunter Jackson