Early Detection a Boon for Manufacturer Texas Instruments

Lyndal Cairns (InfluxData) — Wed, 12 Jan 2022 04:00:42 -0700

When your production line runs at nearly 100 percent capacity, even a momentary blip can cost your organization a packet. That’s why Texas Instruments is using InfluxDB to monitor its manufacturing operation and detect problems before they become costly.

Texas Instruments’ Probe Engineering and Manufacturing Supervisor Michael Hinkle came across InfluxDB when searching for a way to identify and troubleshoot problems in real time on the production line. Operating 24/7 at lightning speed across multiple countries, TI designs, manufactures, tests, and sells the powerful but fragile “wafer” semiconductors that power many high-tech instruments and appliances. Michael oversees 1.5 million data points streaming in daily to an observability platform that monitors machine health and productivity, repair time, and thousands of other metrics. He joined us for a webinar in which he explained how his company was using the InfluxDB platform to leverage its industrial time series data.

Michael said previous attempts at observability could only surface historical data in a report format that was laborious to produce and that failed to serve different business units. To make good decisions, he needed an array of dashboards based on streaming data, with alerts for heat spikes or other signals that could indicate likely problems. And he wanted a platform with tools that were smart enough to identify anomalous signs before the problem became a calamity.

“I need to have immediate feedback if or when a tool issue arises…If, say, a diffusion furnace ended up failing and I wasn’t paying attention or my eye wasn’t on the ball, I could scrap $50,000 or $100,000 worth of product in the blink of an eye. So it’s critical to be able to know real-time or very soon if something atypical is occurring on the (factory) floor.”

He said with upwards of 1,000 different signals of potential trouble to monitor, the end goal was to build apps that can surface only the critical issues and eventually, take action themselves. “Ultimately, the goal is to have a system that’s automated enough that if there’s a problem, it can shut down,” he said.

Explore the Texas Instruments implementation in this on-demand video, or read the full case study.

Why I Joined InfluxData - Lyndal Cairns

Lyndal Cairns (InfluxData) — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 04:00:01 -0700

Ask five copywriters about their career paths and you’ll get five different stories. Mine has certainly been unconventional. From my start in music journalism through the heady early days of online news websites, many years in nonprofits, and a stint in travel tech, three values have propelled me: Community, integrity, and purpose. At InfluxData, I think I have found my trifecta.

1. Community: The team really cares that I do well

Meetings at nearly every company start with a “hello, how are you?” At InfluxData, it is two sentences. People seem to genuinely care how you’re doing and how they can help. As a writer, you spend a lot of time talking to the walls. That’s fine — it’s an important part of the process. But so is having a team you can collaborate and share ideas with.

2. Integrity: We have a great product that we dogfood ourselves

I have worked with a lot of tech companies and I can tell you that most marketing departments are at arm’s length from their products. They understand the technology enough — they think — to do their jobs. Often they don’t and it shows: Blogs and emails devolve into gibberish. Ads are riddled with meaningless buzzwords. And the tweets. My god, the tweets.

At InfluxData, I see widespread commitment to understanding the things we build and how our users and customers get value from them. That informs and elevates our work.

3. Purpose: Accelerating my own time to awesome

Though sometimes it takes a herculean effort to get there, great content feels like magic. At this stage of my career, I am looking for the support and space to create really beautiful things. My goal is to seize every opportunity to improve and I feel like I can do that here. So let’s make magic! ?

InfluxData Blog - Lyndal Cairns

Early Detection a Boon for Manufacturer Texas Instruments

Why I Joined InfluxData - Lyndal Cairns

1. Community: The team really cares that I do well

2. Integrity: We have a great product that we dogfood ourselves

3. Purpose: Accelerating my own time to awesome