Co Tyrone based firm boost productivity

Copeland Corporation in Co Tyrone expects to save over £220,000 this year from an Invest NI-backed business improvement programme.

The Cookstown based facility, part of a US-owned air conditioning and refrigeration compressors manufacturer, used the Six Sigma programme, provided by Invest NI’s Business Improvement Services, to identify the reasons behind manufacturing inefficiencies that were adversely affecting the company’s productivity and adding to overall costs.

The company, part of the Emerson Climate Technologies of St Louis, Missouri, tackled the problem by means of four separate Six Sigma projects that involved setting up employee teams to pinpoint and analyse the problems and to recommend remedial action. All the projects were completed within six months.

One of the projects focused on waste levels resulting from manufacture of a key component used in the compressors.

Declan Billington, Copeland’s Plant Manager at Cookstown, said Six Sigma had provided a structured approach to obtain essential data about aspects of the manufacturing operation.

“We found Six Sigma to be an excellent technique that enables us to make better informed decisions that are based on accurate data from a continuous monitoring of particular machinery. It changes the culture of a business to make decisions based on this real time data.

“By using Invest NI’s Six Sigma programme we were able, for example, to use the data to pinpoint a problem causing waste and to reduce levels in one important process by over 60 percent with obvious benefits in terms of cost savings, increased productivity and consistently high quality products,” he added.

Victor Jordan, Head of Invest NI’s Business Improvement Services, added that Invest NI’s support for the project was in line with the agency's Principles for Business Support which seeks to offer a customised business solution to help companies achieve sustainable growth.

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