Digital engineering training courses announced

AMAP is hosting a series of local training events that enable attendees to learn more about the range of digital engineering products.

AMAP - Digital Factory Project, a One Northeast and NEPA funded project - is hosting a series of local training events that enable attendees to learn more about the range of digital engineering products.

Thousands of business people are expected to learn about new digital engineering software benefits and a package of help available to bolster North East firms competing in an increasingly fierce global marketplace.

Regional based AMAP (Institute for Automotive and Manufacturing Advanced Practice) is hosting a series of local training events that enable visitors to learn more about the range of digital engineering products such as SolidWorks productivity tools and the business benefits that can be gained from digital technologies.

Manufacturing is a cornerstone of the regional economy - employing 169,000 people in the North East, contributing 25% of its GDP and generating GBP 2.6 billion in wages every year.

Sajid Abdullah, Lead Consultant at the University of Sunderland, will welcome delegates.

"These important events will develop a new manufacturing future in our region".

"The training sessions will prove to be most informative, and in-touch with the requirements of the real world, a vital skill required by our present future/designers, needed to fill our technology gap" he said.

North East manufacturers must concentrate on producing high value, specialised products to stave off the threat from low cost competitors, such as China, India and Eastern Europe.

Firms in the North East cannot compete on labour costs alone against these low-cost competitors.

Companies must innovate if they are to succeed in the future.

Links between North East companies and academia need to be built upon to ensure the best ideas and technologies are rolled out into North East companies first.

A package of help is available to manufacturers to boost their productivity and aid product innovation.

More than 100 delegates from dozens of firms across the North East have signed up and attended the training events so far arranged by the University of Sunderland's institute for Automotive and Manufacturing Advanced Practice (AMAP) on behalf of the North East Productivity Alliance (NEPA).

NEPA and the manufacturing advisory service North East (MAS-NE) form the region's support programme for manufacturers to boost productivity, skills and competitiveness.

Delegates will be told that a comprehensive package of support is being rolled out across the region by NEPA and MAS-NE to help businesses face up to and overcome challenges in the global marketplace.

Abdullah also mentioned "Delegates will touch and feel SolidWorks in a structured environment".

"More importantly it is a pre-requite to any Solidworks Essentials Training Course".

"Each student will be provided with their own computer during the training".

"When you leave you will have the basic skills necessary to create a simple part, work with an assembly and create a drawing, which will help our companies to be at the top of the value chain in years to come".

The project aims to develop a body of knowledge for regional businesses to use to improve their practices and compete on a global stage.

The NEPA project is funded by One NorthEast, the Learning and skills council and the European Social Fund and operates four separate projects developed by industry for industry.

The projects are the Dissemination of Best Practice, Workforce Development, Digital Factory and Engineering Fellows.

NEPA also oversees The Digital Factory project - which helps firms adopt new technologies to boost productivity.

It has assisted over 150 companies and delivered 2500 training opportunities.

As a result of Digital Factory training, one North East company saved EUR 2 million from a single day's tuition in the use of a software application costing less than GBP 200.

Mark Rutherford, One NorthEast Head of Business Productivity, said: "NEPA has successfully worked in over 250 companies since its launch in 2002, helping firms significantly boost their productivity and save millions of pounds".

He said: "The NEPA projects combined have trained over 7000 engineering and manufacturing staff in new skills".

MGM Precision Engineering General Works Manager Bob Payne said "'MGM are a leader in the very competitive sub-contract machining market as such we need to be at least one step ahead of our competition".

"The introduction of the most up to date machine tools couple with extensive training programmes gives a clear indication of where we as a company are moving".

"The ability to respond to customers' requests is paramount in the sub-contract business and with the introduction of Soildworks has enabled MGM to do just that".

"The benefits of Soildworks are there to see we now have the capacity to design and create jigs / fixtures and engineering solutions much quicker, our IT manager (Jason Rutherford) is now able to cascade down his experience to our skilled work force and most importantly our apprentices who all spend time working on Solidworks as a matter of course".

"We at MGM would like to congratulate The University of Sunderland for their professional input into the training project (a job well done)".

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