From tap engineer to all-around application solution provider
Reiko Masuhara | OSG Corporation
Masatoshi Nojiri began his career at OSG Corporation 25 years ago. The first five years was spent at OSG’s Yana Factory – the largest tap manufacturing plant in the world – as a tap engineer. After mastering the ins and outs of taps, Nojiri was assigned to a major Japanese automotive manufacturer as a guest engineer to train, to oversee new production lines, and to troubleshoot various application obstacles. Upon returning from the Japanese automaker, Nojiri was assigned with a new role – sales engineer for domestic Japanese automotive manufacturers. When the Application Engineering (AE) division was established six years ago, Nojiri once again assumed a new role – applications engineer, a.k.a. OSG’s tooling expert.
Experts have to work hard to become experts too.
With a formal training specialized mainly in taps, it was not easy for Nojiri to leave his comfort zone in the beginning. Unlike the die/mold industry, which typically involves only milling tools, it is said that there are approximately 20,000 to 30,000 parts per motor vehicle in automotive manufacturing, which are produced by a variety of machining processes and require a wide spectrum of cutting tools.
“Our customers in the automotive sector have many application experts,” Nojiri explained. “Unless you are an all-around tooling master, it can be intimidating and you may have a hard time answering some of their questions.”
To fill the knowledge gaps, Nojiri relies on his teammates and other divisions for support. Members of the AE division are experts of every kind. The team is composed of engineers with various tooling and profession background. Like Nojiri, many have also served as guest engineers and have worked in various departments ranging from product development, engineering, production and sales.
“Experience and knowledge are the keys to understanding our end users’ pain points,” said Nojiri. “For instance, having worked at a production facility enables me to better comprehend the manufacturing process and delivery time, which are critical pieces to the total solution we provide to our clients,” said Nojiri.
Have an application problem? We have the solution.
In comparison to other engineering divisions, the AE team requires even greater direct interactions with the end users because all of AE’s solutions are customized solutions. OSG not only supply powerful standard cutting tools for manufacturing, but also provide tailored application solutions to help clients facilitate better processing with higher efficiency and longer durability based on their specific needs.
When an application trouble arises, the AE team will almost always visit the end user instead of making a decision based solely on other representatives’ feedback.
“If a tool breaks, we must find out how and why,” said Nojiri. “Most operators will only tell you it broke but not specifying how and why. Factors such as regrinding, changes in work material and cutting conditions can easily influence performance. It is our job to find out exactly what factors had led to the unsatisfactory result,” said Nojiri.
Manufacturers are always in search for better technologies, shorter processing time and longer tool life. OSG not only respond to user request but also has the capability to propose new solutions with its AE division.
OSG’s engineering, manufacturing and sales divisions work in unity globally to offer processing methods optimized for each customer’s cutting environment. If you have an application problem, OSG has a solution.
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