1 SOLVAY The Sarralbe Experience Sarralbe is the name of a town in France, close to the border between France and Germany. In this town Solvay has a Production Plant. This presentation refers to the recent experience gained by Solvay at that Plant.

2 Project Geography

3 Solvay:Four Sectors of Activity, One Strategy It has always been the policy of the Solvay Group to focus its efforts on product sectors where it has experience and know-how. The diversity of Solvay's activities is the result of systematic development of the by-products of each manufacturing process. This diversification centers on four sectors of activity, governed by a single industrial and commercial strategy.

4 Pharmaceuticals Pharmaceuticals Research with Life in Mind Development of sales by sector (%) Chemicals Chemicals The building blocks of Chemistry Plastics Plastics Custom-made Materials Processing Processing From Plastics to Finished Products Consistent Growth in Any Sector

5 More than 400 entities... Total 1999 sales: EUR 7,869 M (USD 7,905 M) Solvay Global Presence

6 More than 400 entities... Solvay Global Presence

7 Purpose of the Sarralbe Project General purpose: to find a solution managing production/consumption data inside an ERP system. Chosen ERP system: SAP R/3 Communication protocol: PI-PCS For the complete assessment we planned two different types of tests: A) Tests of performance and reliability of the PIMS system. Covered subjects were: Security at the tag level, add-in for MS Excel, Integration of external RDB, Calculations, User friendliness, Reliability, Archive Migration, Manual DE B) Tests of data exchange between the selected PIMS system and SAP R/3 PP-PI module. Covered subjects to prove were: Download of a recipe to PIMS/DCS: ability of having SAP automatically sending recipes to PIMS system. Buffering: FIFO recipes queue properly works. Execution order can be changed. Batch Data Management: batch data handshake between PIMS and SAP properly works. Shift based data exchange: polymerisation row materials consumptions are sent on a regular time basis.

8 Project Timing and Project Team First Approach: a non standard solution. Application to develop Duration: 8 months Team (mainly involved): 3 people from Solvay, 3 consultant people Results: We could only simulate events and messages No buffering, no download of a recipe on dcs event, no traceability Limited solution: only one event (start/stop campaign) and only one batch, no quality management Summary: we only proved that a solution could be developped, but we didn’t have one Second Approach: usage of a standard solution. Usage of proved software: PI + RLINK Duration: 4 weeks including time spent for testing PI system (January 2001) Team (mainly involved): 2 people from Solvay, 2 people from CSC Synapsys, 1 person from OSI Results: Real events and messages Buffering, download of a recipe on dcs events, traceability We could split a campaign into several batches, in/out of quality Summary: only configuration and MMI customization was necessary

9 Project Description PIMS DCS Interface to DCS (CHIP) PI Real time data base PSRLINK PP-PI SAP R/3 PP-PI (PI-PCS interface) PIMS application Process Business Real-time Transaction Sarralbe plant Prototype Architecture

10 Project Description (cont) PIMS Application on PI-ProcessBook Physical Architecture

11 Project Description (cont) Targets (scope of the test) Download of recipe from SAP to PIMS Goods issues declaration on a time basis (shift) Goods receipts declaration on operator confirmation basis Batch update E1 Start of the campaign E2 Stop of the campaign E3 Change of quality (product) E4 Tank is full The Process E1 E3 E2 E4 E3E4 E3 E2 E1 In the “Scope of the test” document the process has been defined as a sequence of batches (in quality, out of quality) to be grouped by the operator according to specific DCS events

12 Project Description (cont) Phases and relevant material lists APHAR_1 characteristics Process instructions Control Recipe ID SAP Recipe

13 Project Description (cont) The prototype implementation required the development of an application able to present production information and to guide the operator to confirm production period for “in quality” and “out of quality” batches. For the prototype, the application has been implemented just to handle the current campaign. The application just provide a MMI interface and has been developed in PI-ProcessBook using the VBA environment. Two displays are provided by the application: A display to manage the current campaign A display that demonstrate how traceability can be implemented Prototype Implementation

14 Description of Solutions List of available SAP batches for the material (read from SAP) Current campaign, list of consumption events (shift) Request for operator Inervention Worked batches according to DCS events DCS Campaign status and time SAP recipe relevant information Managing the current campaign - Consumed Material

15 Description of Solutions Pop-up window proposing batch information Current campaing, list of worked batches and status Managing the current campaign - Production confirmation

16 Description of Solutions In quality batches confirmed Out of quality batches confirmed Worked batches and related status (confirmation) Managing the current campaign - Campaign summary

17 Description of Solutions Periodic time-event partial confirmations to compute activity costs Good issues providing material consumptions Good receipts and batch characteristics confirmations Control recipe status Managing the current campaign - Sap view of the process messages

18 Description of Solutions Process information related to selected batch In quality/Out of specification batches for the campaign Worked campaignes Traceability of the campaigns

19 Summary of the experience Most significant points of our experience with PI + RLINK solution are Reliability ok General Configuration of recipes and events is possible Customization of MMI is necessary Customization of handshaking between PI and DCS for the recipe download must be made A long training is necessary to own knowledge on the SAP and RLINK side

20 Next steps at short-medium term To enforce presence of PI system inside Solvay Polyolefins Europe. We are going to propose PI + RLINK as a solution for a complete integration of the data.

21 Any Questions?