Large, Medium, and Small Win-Win Smart Factories Boost Mass Production of Domestic Diagnostic Kits

Entrance of Solgent Headquarters, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon. Photo by Moon Hyewon, Asia Economy

[Asia Economy Reporter Moon Hyewon] Solgent, a subsidiary of EDGC (Eone Diagnomics Genome Center), has boosted its overseas exports of diagnostic kits by increasing productivity by 73% through the introduction of smart factories. The large-, medium-, and small-sized win-win smart factory dissemination project is a program jointly promoted by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups and the Korea Federation of SMEs since April this year, in collaboration with Samsung Electronics Smart Factory Support Center, in response to the urgent need for smart process innovation among manufacturers due to the surge in global orders for diagnostic kits.

On the 10th, at the large-, medium-, and small-sized win-win smart factory on-site innovation briefing held at Solgent in Yuseong-gu, Daejeon, Solgent announced that productivity dramatically increased by about 73%, from 11,900 kits per week to 20,571 kits, through the smart factory dissemination project.

Solgent revealed that Samsung Electronics quickly dispatched about 20 smart factory expert mentors to the site, identifying 73 tasks ranging from material management and logistics route optimization to packaging process improvement and automation equipment introduction, supporting process improvements.

First, to manage materials and products separately, a barcode system was introduced, and logistics routes were optimized, reducing travel distance by 34% from 148m to 98m. In addition to domesticating containers that were previously imported, they improved bottlenecks in the packaging process. Automation equipment was also introduced for vision inspection, reagent dispensing, and labeling tasks. As a result, Solgent explained that the defect rate due to foreign substances in containers improved by 40%.

Seok Dosu, co-CEO of Solgent, said, “We faced great difficulties as demand surged requiring mass production after producing small quantities of various products, compounded by the suspension of tube imports from Germany. However, this became possible through the innovation and infrastructure support from the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, the Korea Federation of SMEs, and Samsung.” He added, “We aim to become a global molecular diagnostics company that alleviates the worries of people suffering from COVID-19 worldwide and helps them return to daily life.”

Jung Wookjo, head of the Innovation Growth Headquarters at the Korea Federation of SMEs, stated, “In cooperation with Samsung, we plan to continuously support the transfer of know-how in systems, digitalization, and ultra-precision fields to diagnostic kit and COVID-19 health product companies, fostering the development of the bio-industry and contributing to overcoming COVID-19.”

Kang Sungcheon, Vice Minister of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, said, “This briefing is significant as a representative case where the government and large and small-medium enterprises cooperated to find smart solutions and achieve results in responding to COVID-19 and resolving production difficulties at SME sites.” He added, “We plan to further strengthen smart factory support for on-site innovation of SMEs.”

Meanwhile, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups plans to sequentially hold ‘Smart Factory On-site Innovation Briefings’ for diagnostic kit companies such as SD Biosensor and CoGen Biotech, which are adopting smart factories, to verify dissemination performance.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.