Wesley van Ophuizen, director-owner: 'With Ferross 2.0 we are kicking it into gear'

The vision, strategy and goals are crystal clear: the plan to realize Ferross 2.0 is complete and the rollout is underway. Wesley: "We are going for 25% more efficiency, both in production, and in our business processes. That is hefty, of course, but I am convinced we will succeed.'

Ferross 2.0 has two main pillars. The first is a change around the company's real estate and production, the second is a renewed approach around digitalization and process design. A great occasion to highlight the 25 years of cooperation with Liemar, but especially to talk with Wesley about Ferross' ambitious future plans.

Doing more with less real estate

Five years ago Wesley bought some of the Ferross shares. 'The moment you take over a company, you start looking at it differently. Where are the returns? What changes do we see in the market and how are we going to respond? We saw a changing need from our customers around steel preservation. Sustainability has become a major concern and that means that hot-dip galvanizing or powder coating is chosen more often and our wet-paint preservation hall costs more money than it generates. By outsourcing conservation, we already need about 1,400 m2 less space.'

In addition, the entire layout is undergoing a major overhaul. 'We sought advice, based on our tonnages and our future prospects. This showed that we could work more efficiently with a back-to-back system on Voortman's saw/drill. That means putting our machines in a specific line. That efficiency, in turn, means that we will no longer need certain machines and we will store less material (indoors). At the bottom line, all of this means that of the eight halls, we are divesting the oldest three. In those halls all the pre-processing took place and we are moving that to the old conservation hall. On the site in front of the halls will be our new office. In addition, we are investing in a new profile laser. So we are really gaining momentum.'

Process optimization and the digital workplace

What we have seen in the past 40 years in terms of developments in automation and digitalization, we will see again, but now in just 10 years, Wesley expects. 'The aging of the labor market brings challenges, but the arrival of the younger generation also definitely offers opportunities. If you see what twenty-somethings can do with a computer and how eager they are to bet on automation, you see that many things can be done faster and smarter. So that is what we are going to focus strongly on with Ferross 2.0.'

The internal move is a perfect opportunity to scrutinize and optimize business processes. 'We have been working for years with our own version of Liemar, our indoor version. Just a quick this, a quick that. That gets in the way of methodical work. That's why we want to move to LiemarX as it was intended. And as part of our goal of working paperless, we started rolling out the digital workshop. This means that everyone works with a tablet and can see the drawings on it. Our internal communication is via the app. We are already noticing that communication among ourselves is a lot clearer now that we are working with tablets up to date.'

Want to know more?

Wesley and his team are using 2024 to further roll out Ferross 2.0. 'Then we can really accelerate from 2025.' Want to know more about Ferross' digital workshop? Read the article published in the Concrete & Steel Construction magazine. You can also visit the website at https://ferross-staalbouw.nl/ and read more about Ferross' history and ambition.