With corporate headquarters in Forks Township and facilities around the world, Victaulic can be thought of as a sales company and an engineering company, but at its heart is a manufacturer.
That’s according to John Malloy, the company’s chairman, president and CEO, who spoke about the future of manufacturing this week at Northampton Community College in Bethlehem Township.
Victaulic, a producer of mechanical pipe joining solutions, is the largest employer of steelworkers in the Lehigh Valley, Malloy said. Jobs and workers became a central theme of the discussion as advancements in automation lead to fewer employees in manufacturing.
“It does have very, very significant implications for the workforce,” Malloy said.
However, automation will allow for more production in the U.S. and create more jobs for engineers.
Malloy said productivity will increase, particularly over the next 10 years. Automation also is creating opportunities for new types of employees.
“It creates jobs for manufacturing engineers,” Malloy said. “In the last three to four years, we tripled our manufacturing engineering organization. We hope that all the steelworkers working for us today can retire with us. The workforce is going to change, perhaps fewer jobs but more productivity.”
OUTPUT ON THE RISE
Prior to his career at Victaulic, Malloy spent 19 years working for United Technologies Corp., rising to president for North America for UTC’s carrier division.
Malloy said he was particularly disappointed to hear that the company is closing its Indianapolis plant, where he had once worked, and is sending operations to Mexico, a move that will affect about 1,400 jobs.
While a perception still exists in the U.S. that nothing is manufactured here anymore, “nothing could be further from the truth,” he said.
“We [American manufacturers] are producing almost twice as much output today as we did 25 years ago,” Malloy said. What’s more, the nation’s manufacturing production is accomplished using about 40 percent fewer people.
LEAN PRODUCTION
“What caused this revolution in productivity?” Malloy said.
The adoption of lean production practices is behind this jump in productivity and will come into play even more so in the future as automation, 3-D modeling and printing and robotics gain ground.
Companies that adopted lean production techniques have transformed their operations, Malloy said.
Lean manufacturing involves developing organizational systems that reduce wasted time locating supplies and products or the need to move far distances on the shop floor in the daily production process.
By reorganizing shop floors and creating new production methods, manufacturers have stored fewer products in their facilities, resulting in cleaner, more efficient operations.
Companies in the U.S. began to implement lean manufacturing processes by borrowing lean principles of auto production in Japan.
LEADING IN AUTOMATION
Victaulic went through its own adoption of lean production practices about 10 to 12 years ago, he said. Now, factories throughout the world have these practices in place.
“I believe we are going to still be leaders in manufacturing, but it will come from a different approach,” Malloy said.
That approach will be automation, which has already driven production in the fields of farming and construction. In the future, it will continue to change the manufacturing industry and boost productivity.
Victaulic has been borrowing and implementing these technologies, including 3-D drawings, which change the way it designs projects. The company completed much of the piping that connects the chillers inside the ice rink at PPL Center in Allentown and created a 3-D drawing for the project, Malloy said.
Victaulic also completed a 3-D print of a part for a pipeline in Canada, which was designed by engineers at the Forks plant, he added.
3-D printing is being used not just at Victaulic but by manufacturers throughout the nation.
INVESTING IN TECHNOLOGY
Victaulic used automation to create sprinklers and inspect couplings. These processes not only improve productivity, particularly for couplings, but can detect tiny imperfections in the casting process.
Victaulic had tried using automation processes about 12 years ago, but is looking to invest in more technologies.
“We are not going to take as long to make the next investment in automation,” Malloy said.
“We are planning on introducing other types of automation to improve yields, reduce scrap and improve quality, as well.”
CHANGES UNDERWAY
In the foundry at Forks, the company is planning changes that would increase the percentage of good castings and reduce the percentage of scrap.
The company is implementing some of these changes at the Forks plant but still needs to perfect them, possibly in the next two years, he said.
Mark Erickson, president of NCC, said that Malloy spent three years teaching at a community college and noted that NCC was lucky to have the CEO of a major company speak to students and staff.
About 150 people attended the late-morning event.
