Case Study

Van Beek BV increases quality and speed with PTC’s

Creo™ Elements/Direct™ Software

Formerly CoCreate ®

Van Beek BV, Drunen, The Netherlands

Delivering superior quality products within very short lead

times is essential to Van Beek’s business. The company’s
stainless-steel screw conveyors, which link production stages
together, are an indispensable part of manufacturing lines.

Van Beek has some 70 years of experience, and employs

30 people, eight of which are engineers that manage
approximately 1200 customer projects each year. Each project
consists of several screw conveyors.

The Challenge: Increase design speed; cut costs

and lead times

• Derive 3D representations of design projects quickly

• Effectively work on evolving design specifications

• Reduce lead times with better efficiency and factory
performance
• Increase quality for best competitive advantage
The Solution: Direct modeling and PDM tools from PTC
The Results: Faster design of higher-quality products
• 50% faster design, and 90% reduction in data size in
explorative design projects
• Unforeseen changes easily incorporated late in the
design process

• Creo Elements/Direct Modeling (formerly CoCreate • Engineers can quickly change existing geometry to
Modeling) 3D CAD design software reflect new specs of a new project

• Creo Elements/Direct Model Manager (formerly • Delivering error-free customer designs and better
CoCreate Model Manager) product data products by moving to 3D
management software

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“The Creo Elements/Direct Modeling approach
has proven to be very fast for us. Even after
many iterations of design changes, the models
can be handled by anybody in the team. All our
unexpected changes could easily be incorporat-
ed into the models.”
– Karten Verhoeven
Head of ICT
Van Beek BV
When assembling production lines, companies today
generally wait until the final stage before ordering custom
conveyor systems. That, in turn, creates immense pressure
on Van Beek to deliver high-quality products within tight
lead times. As such, the company uses a highly automated
logistical process to deliver accurate quotations, optimal
customer support, and an aligned supplier network.
Dutch-based Van Beek further improved performance by
introducing 3D CAD (computer-aided design) and PDM
(product data management) software to its environment. To
remain ahead of the competition, it was necessary to improve
product designs, raise quality, and cut lead times and costs.
This goal involved driving product development – from
conception to completion – by working flexibly and quickly on
evolving design specifications. Moreover, Van Beek needed an
approach to product design that would help accelerate the
design process. The ability to quickly show design concepts to
their clients was vital to Van Beek’s success.
Page 2 of 3 | Van Beek BV – Creo Elements/Direct
Case Study
Van Beek BV focuses its production entirely on producing
high-quality products within short lead times. Its ERP system
is a home-built solution that supports rapid production of
quotes, provides direct insight into order status, facilitates
purchasing, and controls production. In fact, the ERP system
unifies all the company’s business data, no matter the
actual source.
To cut lead time further and assure quality, Van Beek migrated
its customized 2D software to 3D direct CAD and PDM. With
3D CAD, the company had a number of goals: to increase
response times with the customer; to handle unforeseen
changes at each stage of product development; and to take
advantage of the increased speed and flexibility of direct
modeling to produce error-free designs. As a result, the
company reasoned, 3D CAD would streamline engineering
and limit production interruptions in the factory.
“We started our search for 3D by looking at PDM at the same
time,” says Marten Verhoeven, Head of ICT at Van Beek BV.
“PDM-evaluation followed immediately, so implementation could
be done simultaneously.”
Verhoeven looked closely at the practical usability of a
parametric-based 3D CAD application, as well as the direct
modeling approach to 3D product development.
Verhoeven quickly found that the Creo Elements/Direct direct
modeling approach to 3D product development was better
suited to their needs, as the company is primarily interested
in rapidly deriving designs, without having to create or
maintain a recipe of parametric design features that produce
that geometry. In order to achieve this goal, the company
needed a design solution that enabled rapid and unlimited
iterations of the design, due to the vast amount of changes
that occurred late in the design process.
PTC.com
 Case Study

“Since we have to cope with constantly changing input from
our clients, we needed a system that supports our need
to incorporate a huge amount of unforeseeable changes,”
says Verhoeven.
Verhoeven and his team spent quite some time evaluating
competing modeling approaches by putting the 3D CAD
tools to real-world tests. “In a pilot project, we started
to process customer orders, which is the best way to
evaluate an engineering application,” explains Verhoeven.
“The direct modeling approach has proven to be very fast for
us. Even after many iterations of design changes, the models
can be handled by anybody in the team. All our unexpected
changes could easily be incorporated into the models,”
explains Verhoeven.
Needless to say, the engineers at Van Beek did not have to
spend any time thinking about building intelligent models –
they simply explored their various design alternatives by freely
interacting with the geometry directly.
Van Beek also found that Creo Elements/Direct Modeling
was an ideal choice when engineers were taking an existing
design and using it as the starting point for a new creative
design project. The direct modeling approach allowed
designers to quickly change the existing geometry to reflect
the new specs of the new project.
Another major benefit of the solution is that the company’s
ERP system can fully access the data. Bills-of-material
are fully synchronized, including support for long lead
items. “Purchase orders for our supply network are based
on the bills-of-material,” says Verhoeven. “The system
automatically provides the right data from Creo Elements/Direct
Model Manager.”
Drawings are generated automatically, including all annotation,
DXF and PDF files.
Concludes Verhoeven: “Creo Elements/Direct Modeling and
Creo Elements/Direct Model Manager streamline the Van
Beek business process and meet the demands for improved
quality and reduced lead times while keeping personnel
happy. Our engineers are very fast and highly flexible in
evolving their 3D-based designs.”
© 2010, Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC). All rights reserved. Information
concerning the benefits and results obtained by customers using PTC solutions is based upon
the particular user’s experience and testimonial, is furnished for informational use only, and
should not be construed as a guarantee or commitment by PTC. Due to the varying degree
of complexity of our customers’ products and/or their design processes, typical or generally
expected results are not available. PTC, the PTC Logo, Creo, Elements/Direct, CoCreate, and
all PTC product names and logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of PTC and/or its
subsidiaries in the United States and in other countries. All other product or company names
are property of their respective owners.
6002 – Van Beek BV – Creo Elements/Direct – CS-EN-1210

After a careful evaluation of competing solutions, Van Beek

decided to invest in Creo Elements/Direct Modeling. “We
implemented Creo Elements/Direct Model Manager along
with Creo Elements/Direct Modeling to be sure of accurate
data management,” says Verhoeven. “This is important to
Van Beek’s processes because the ERP system relies on the
availability of the right data at the right time.”

The final implementation is so well integrated that Van Beek’s

engineers can do everything in the product development
process – from quotation to delivery – using only the Creo
Elements/Direct Modeling interface. Engineers add the metadata,
and Creo Elements/Direct Model Manager adds production-
specific data from Creo Elements/Direct Modeling.

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