The opening event of the new plant of Ardemagni Spa (an Italian excellence that is part of Duferco) has been held last June 10th. «The old headquarters at Cinisello Balsamo have been recently dismantled – explained Stefano Sacchi, CEO and Giovanni Lanza, Vice-president – after some months of transition that saw the coexistence of both sites. Nowadays we are operating at full rate in the new site, located in Emilia avenue at Cinisello Balsamo, at a distance of one kilometre and a half from the previous one, in Monfalcone 25 street».
The choice of not abandoning the zone mirrors the will of not losing the key logistic advantages.
«Previously we relied on 6,000 covered square metres in 3 different workshops – they affirmed – whereas today everything is concentrated in a single factory taking up 10,000 covered square metres, organized with a much smarter layout, devised according to a lean concept. The space is equipped with 4 slitter manufacturing machines placed in a row».
In the new site they have installed two brand-new slitting lines, which allow faster production featuring excellent quality. Moreover, they have perfected two packaging lines, one of them fully automated. «This new project has been accomplished in May – they added – with the installation of other two slitting lines, resulting in 4 slitters and three packaging lines in all. Worth highlighting the system on automated carriages that transport the coils from the warehouse to machines: a concept of Industry 4.0 where all plants are interconnected with our IT infrastructures».
In the new 10,000 covered square meters, Ardemagni has dedicated broad space to the warehouse, with a maximum capacity of 15,000 tons of stock on site, an aspect that today is more crucial than ever: a certainty for customers that can always have available material and for the production that can be optimized.
In 2010, Duferco and China Steel Corporation accomplished the takeover of Ardemagni service centre. It is a steel service centre that receives large coils of electrical steel that is then slit for the creation of strips with different widths depending on the requirements of customers, which are mainly manufacturers of motors and laminations.
Today, Ardemagni imports, processes and distributes electrical steel from China Steel Corporation in Italy and in Europe, with an export percentage amounting to 50%.