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Bild von Wingcopter Mitarbeitende, die lächelnd in die Kamera schauen, daneben das Wingcopter Logo und Wingcopter 198 Hover Mode | Success Story Wingcopter

Wingcopter: Flying logistics at its best

Wingcopter is a German manufacturer of electrically powered delivery drones that can take off and land vertically (so-called eVTOLs, vertical take-off and landing aircraft). This young company offers drone delivery services that, for example, optimize medical supply chains and ensure the logistics of the last mile for the delivery of urgently needed packages, tools, spare parts, and food. The vision of the 120-person team is to improve and save lives worldwide with meaningful commercial and humanitarian applications. Wingcopter is a Technology Pioneer of the World Economic Forum (WEF).

Wingcopter’s delivery drones are equipped to handle almost all weather and terrain conditions. Thanks to its patented tilt-rotor mechanism and software algorithms, the Wingcopter 198 can perform vertical take-off and landing maneuvers like a multicopter while flying long distances as efficiently and quickly as a drone equipped with rigid-fixed wings, even in rain and strong wind.

The Wingcopter 198 transports up to six kilograms of payload over a distance of up to 110 kilometers and reaches speeds of up to 110 kilometers per hour. The start-up’s investors include REWE Group, Salvia, XAI Technologies, Xplorer Capital, Futury Capital, ITOCHU, DROHNENFONDS, SYNERJET, EXPA, Hessen Kapital III, and Corecam Capital Partners.

Challenge

No release processes for 3D models, 2D drawings, and documents, no uniform standard product structure, the Data duplication became excessive and a recently launched PLM platform was not fully configured to meet all of these requirements

Consulting Approach

The PLM specialists of valantic analyzed Wingcopter’s processes, infrastructure, and business requirements

Customer Benefit and Solution

Developement of an integrated solution with four key components

valantic's PLM solution at Wingcopter in detail

Plattform governance
  • Rules and guidelines for identity and access management
  • Goal-oriented configuration of the platform
  • Strategy and definition of the data model
Product data management
  • Metadata management
    • Attributes,
    • naming and numbering
    • Classifications
  • Library/catalogs
    • (Raw)materials and semi-finished products
    • Technologies
    • Equipment
    • Standard parts
  • PLM product structure (single structure/multi-view)
    • As-designed (EBOM) & As-planned (MBOM)
    • Control of the configuration through efficiencies
Lean fast-track change, release, and approval process

End-2-end change process

  • Change
  • Approval (routes) and release

Tool configuration for (approving) user groups, route templates

PLM Wiki community and knowledge base
  • Intuitive document repository for PLM guidelines, procedures, tutorials, tips and tricks (3DSwym)
  • Discussions, polls, etc.

Delivery drones are used for many, very different tasks and therefore have to comply with the different requirements of the local authority. This presents significant challenges for Wingcopter’s engineers responsible for planning, configuration, and production. They are confronting a kind of squaring of the circle: The aim is to adapt each product individually to the customer’s requirements and at the same time further develop the uniform product baseline.

These conflicting requirements have the potential to put any start-up into a precarious situation. The right PLM strategy, which starts as early as possible in the product life cycle, is therefore particularly important. Transparency, efficiency, and the entire company’s success depend on this strategy, especially in the aerospace industry, which cannot afford the start-up luxury of a “fail fast, fail often” culture. Wingcopter had to do everything right the first time.

Project phases of the joint PLM project that put Wingcopter back on track and significantly increased its agility and efficiency (Source: valantic)

Project phases of the joint PLM project that put Wingcopter back on track and significantly increased its agility and efficiency

After just over three months, the implemented solution had put Wingcopter back on track. And perhaps more importantly: The engineering team at Wingcopter had become a collaborative entity, due simply to the way the overall project was conducted.

Your Contact

Are you dealing with similar challenges? Please feel free to contact us for a non-binding meeting to get to know each other. We look forward to hearing from you.

Dieter Dragon, valantic

Dieter Dragon

valantic Supply Chain Excellence