The Komax Group has defined the development of non-automotive markets as one of its key strategic priorities. Within this focus, the industrial and infrastructure segment stands out, offering the most substantial contribution and significant growth potential. Over the past two decades, the Komax Group has made great progress in this segment and has taken another major step forward with the combination with Schleuniger in 2022. Today, the Komax Group offers comprehensive digital solutions for control cabinet builders that appeal to major players in the electrical products market. One of them is Siemens.

Siemens – a global leader in technology

Siemens Corporation is a US subsidiary of Siemens AG, a leading technology company focused on industry, infrastructure, transport, and healthcare. By combining the real and the digital worlds, Siemens empowers customers to accelerate their digitalization and sustainability transformations.

Learn more about Siemens in the US

OVERVIEW OF SIEMENS USA

  • 45,000 employees
  • 24 manufacturing sites
  • Active in all 50 US states and Puerto Rico

SIEMENS IN GRAND PRAIRIE, TEXAS

  • Electrical products manufacturing hub
  • 25,400-m²-site with 1,100 employees
  • Zeta 650 and Omega 750 from Komax, and three Schleuniger MultiStrip 9480 process lines in use

Solutions for the Smart Infrastructure manufacturing hub in Texas

Siemens operates 24 manufacturing plants in the US, such as its electrical products manufacturing hub in Grand Prairie in the Dallas–Fort Worth area, Texas. Siemens has invested USD 650 million in new plants and factory expansions in the United States over the past few years, thereby successively implementing automation solutions from the Komax Group. The over 1,000-person plant manufactures power distribution equipment that supports essential power infrastructure in some of the country’s most critical installations, including data centers, industrial sites, and healthcare facilities. This equipment is fitted with immense wiring of very different types, and sizes, that needs to be processed in an increasingly automated way.

Josh Robles, Automation Engineering Lead at Siemens Corporation, shows the Omega 750 at the Siemens site Grand Prairie, Texas, USA.

Komax has been a great partner. We had unique requirements that fell outside of Komax’s usual use cases. Configuration of all the machines required a lot of testing and validation and we felt fully supported on our integration journey.
—  Josh Robles, Automation Engineering Lead at Siemens Corporation

From semi-automated to fully automated and digitalized manufacturing

At the Grand Prairie site, Siemens had several Schleuniger and Komax cut & strip machines in use before 2019 to manufacture wiring for lowvoltage switchgear in a semi-automated way. Driven by market demand, the location then sought to increase its efficiency in wire processing by further raising the level of automation. One of the first steps was a Zeta 650 harness manufacturing machine. Thanks to its eight process modules, the Zeta 650 can process up to 36 wires without changeover, from batch size 1 and just-in-time (> Zeta 650), which was a huge step forward.

While implementing the Zeta 650, the Siemens site also transitioned to a full digital twin of the wire set. This enables testing and validation in the virtual realm before production, accelerating engineering and production processes. With the digital twin established and its experience with the Zeta 650, the Grand Prairie team quickly committed to further conversion of its processing, and the implementation of the Omega 750 (> Omega 750) with increased levels of automation. The Komax machines blend in perfectly as they are fed directly with the manufacturing data from the digital twin and then cut, strip, terminate, label, and bundle the wire harness for the low-voltage switchgear application. This way Siemens created a seamless digitalized and automated manufacturing process, reducing waste, redundancies, and cost.

The Komax Group and Siemens worked closely together in the whole process with the Komax Group addressing the needs and thoughts of its customer with great care, including related service contracts. The close longterm relationship of the two partners paid off and led to a significantly increased level of automation at the Siemens site. Both partners are looking forward to a fruitful continuation in the future.