PTC’s Insight Enables APC to Go Green

By Margaret S. Gurney

A search for an APC part automatically queries a materials library and finds that the part is compliant with EU regulations.

The manufacturing of electronic products is becoming more complicated these days, largely due to new regulations intended to reduce the burgeoning amount of electronic waste that is disposed of in landfills and finds its way into our water supply. In Europe,  these regulations are known as WEEE (waste electronic and electrical equipment), and require manufacturers to take back all discarded electronic equipment and bear the cost of disposal.

  This is not the case in the U.S., but as governments the world over seek ways to cost effectively manage all the electronic devices being thrown away, the WEEE approach is spreading rapidly.

“Electronic trash is the fastest growing stuff entering our landfills,” says Ray Lizotte, director for the environmental stewardship office at APC, a Kingston, RI-based company providing critical power and cooling services, products, software, and systems that was acquired by Schneider Electric two years ago.

Meeting Directives
“To deal with electronic wastes in Europe,  the EU’s WEEE directive deems that manufacturers must be responsible for the disposal of the equipment they make. When we sell equipment in Europe,” says APC’s Lizotte, “we include the price of returning and recycling the products when they reach end of life. This ensures proper disposal.”

  But does this mean the EU is ahead of the U.S. in terms of environmental progress? “Not really, it’s just different. But it’s those differences that have made meeting these requirements a challenge,” says Lizotte, who made sure APC tailored its IT and manufacturing systems to meet EU regulations, so products would sell overseas.

  Associated with the WEEE directive is a second directive referred to as RoHS (restriction of hazardous substances in electronics). The RoHS regulations prohibit the use of certain materials that increase the cost of disposal.

  APC, like a number of U.S. companies, has voluntarily complied with RoHS for all products it manufactures. “Every product eventually has a cost of disposal. When we remove these elements during design, then the EU compliance situation takes care of itself. However, APC, like most companies, had no mechanism in place to comprehend these substances issues.”

Define Company Needs
In 2004, when Lizotte was tasked with leading the company’s search for a system that could integrate with existing business systems at APC,  he only considered systems that could collect data and integrate with the existing ERP system automatically.

  Like other firms, APC had until July 1, 2006, to demonstrate that its products sold in Europe were free of cadmium, mercury, hexavalent chromium (the water-soluble version being particularly toxic to humankind), lead, plus some fire retardants. Lizotte’s job was to make sure APC met the deadline. APC’s method for ensuring that it was not producing anything containing the toxic substances was to verify that they were not purchasing any raw material or component that contained them as well. He knew that to support his efforts he needed software that would interface with his business systems, Oracle and Lotus Notes.

  After narrowing the vendors to six, it was PTC’s Insight (earlier called EMARS) that demonstrated almost instantaneous compatibility with Oracle, and Notes came online a few months later.

To ensure that the APC products conformed to the regulations, the compliance status of approximately 19,000 parts had to be determined. Since every part typically has more than one supplier, this meant getting material content information for 60,000 components provided by manufacturers worldwide, Lizotte explains. APC had to configure a system that could query the manufacturers of those components, and compile into a database the materials contained within the electronics that APC was already using. “It had to be done, or we couldn’t sell our products overseas.”

  Now Insight works in the background supporting the purchasing function and product design engineers. With its connection to Oracle and Lotus Notes, most of the data necessary to keep it current is automatically updated. The only ongoing task is the acquisition of material content data from new suppliers. Lizotte says this is the defining feature of Insight’s power:  “It has allowed us to integrate this data into our existing business systems, in a formal way.”

  Lizotte says Insight manages the process for obtaining data as well as the data itself. “It generates a request for information with pre-loaded supplier contact and part information,” he says, “tracks the status of all the queries, and then manages the uploading of information when it returns.”

  Currently almost all the components APC uses meet the directives. “Insight brings this compliance data to the people who are making decisions that ensure that our products stay compliant. For example, purchasing agents can see if the parts they want to buy are compliant before they issue purchase orders,” says Lizotte. “It has all this built-in” as it stamps parts with a RoHS symbol that communicates compliance. “Its real power of being able to integrate into purchasing, factory management, and new product development is realized every time that little RoHS symbol appears” on the screen.

  The Difference: U.S. and EU
The EU approach to the electronic waste disposal crisis is gaining traction in other parts of the world. What was once a European phenomenon is spreading as local governments try the EU approach to address their local electronic-waste disposal crisis. In the U.S., state and local governments typically handle the collection, recycling, and disposal of electronic wastes,  overburdening the local infrastructure. Due to the large amount of e-waste on the West Coast, Lizotte says California is considering adopting EU regulations. “We’ll see a lot more of this,” he projects.

“One of the attractions to the European approach is that the makers of the products become the regulators. The government doesn’t need inspectors, because APC will do it to protect our ability to sell our products. The developing world is latching on to this concept to save the expense of having to develop their own inspection program,” explains Lizotte.

  The amassing of data, now fully customized by APC, is communicated to other companies seeking material content information about APC products, says Lizotte. “Because of our confidence in Insight and the data in its underlying database, we know we are producing compliant products and can comfortably communicate that data to the public.”

  APC is ready. Since all APC products comply for sale in the EU, it can sell its products anywhere in the world. As the APC website asks:  What’s in your product? 

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Margaret S. Gurney has been an editor for the technology industry for more than 20 years, most recently as new products editor at DE. Send e-mail about this article to [email protected].