Northumbria University help company to boost productivity
Dec 15 2010 by Iain Laing, The Journal
A COLLABORATION between Northumbria University and a tool manufacturer is helping the company to boost productivity.
Research engineer Dr Julfikar Haider is working as an associate at Rotherham-based SNA Europe under a Knowledge Transfer Partnership.
He has been looking into the performance and quality of band saws and has been able to optimise the manufacturing process, which has seen productivity and performance rise from 5% to 30%.
The work Julfikar is doing is the latest in a series of collaborations between Northumbria and SNA Europe. The research carried out on behalf of the company by Northumbria over the last 10 years amounts to more than £1m of help. As a result of the partnership, Professor Håkan Hellbergh, who is the director of manufacturing and industrial strategy for SNA Europe, is now a Visiting Professor at Northumbria.
In his research, Haider has been supervised by world-renowned expert in manufacturing engineering Professor Mohammed Sarwar who is an Emeritus Professor in Northumbria’s School of Computing, Engineering and Information Sciences.
Professor Sarwar, who has a long- standing relationship with SNA Europe, said: “The main benefit to both organisations is in the knowledge and technology that is exchanged.
“In addition, there are opportunities for undergraduate students to visit state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities at SNA and the university benefits from senior members of staff from the company giving talks to our students.
“The research collaboration is further cemented by SNA opening up in China, Belarus and other parts of Europe, which provides more opportunities for Northumbria to contribute to technology transfer programmes which are of mutual benefit.’’
Professor Hellbergh said: “Any company that stands still with regards to science and knowledge gets overtaken. The key to success in this race is knowledge and, thanks to the expertise of Northumbria University and Professor Mohammed Sarwar, knowledge has been transferred from that institution into our company, making SNA Europe now product leader in its field.’’
