For too long, professionals in the manufacturing industry have had to cope with software applications that are designed more for function than usability despite the fact that it is people who are the ones using these solutions in their everyday work lives. From the shop floor and production, to packaging and distribution, the easier and more accessible the solution, the more likely business benefits will accrue. This is particularly relevant for manufacturing businesses in highly regulated industries where mistakes can result in huge fines and brand damage.

At last, the development of engaging user interfaces (UIs) commonplace in consumer applications is coming to manufacturing with the development of a new generation of intuitive UI-designed software applications, from shop floor through to packaging and labelling. Gurdip Singh, CEO at Kallik, argues that prioritising user experience (UX) and the use of intuitive software applications will be crucial in highly regulated manufacturing industries to ensure compliance with the ever growing rules and regulations, all the way through to the label.

Software companies have severely underestimated the needs of label and artwork professionals for sophisticated ways to use solutions, particularly in regulated industries where mistakes can mean fines and damaging recalls. We have all become accustomed to high quality UX in our everyday lives, with intuitive and engaging UI enabling consumers to perform tasks from booking a car service to high-level transactions such as autonomous online banking. This expectation has now reached the manufacturing industry, where label and artwork professionals need the same level of ease of use and convenience from their industrial software as their personal applications.

The label has the power to make or break a business

UX is no small matter. The IEEE reports three of the main reasons for software failure are directly related to UX. The usability of an industrial software application that manufacturing and labelling and artwork professionals have to use every day to do their jobs, has a deep impact that stretches across entire operations from design and production through to distribution and can even influence overall business performance.

First and foremost, poor UX has a significant impact on productivity. If software applications are too complex and are difficult to navigate, this will significantly slow down operations. The lack of intuitive design can even heighten the risk of errors, an issue that can be detrimental in highly regulated industries. With far greater legal, financial and safety implications than most other industries, even the smallest error could result in costly delays to market or damaging product recalls, which could lead to medical device manufacturers, for example, seeing a 10% drop in share price or food and beverage manufacturers seeing up to 55% of customers leave their brand, even if only temporarily.

With nearly 15% of pharmaceutical recalls between 2017-2019 a result of labelling issues, getting it right the first time and keeping it right in label and artwork management is vital but poor software usability can cause unnecessary roadblocks to get the product to market.

Poor UX impacts more than just operations

Not only are there financial ramifications for poor UX, but there are much deeper business issues too. A lack of software usability leads to lowered employee satisfaction where software applications make professionals’ jobs harder or wastes their valuable time on fixing problems. This impact can even go as far as raising levels of staff attrition.

Label and artwork professionals have to manage thousands of labels across multiple product ranges and languages. For example, one leading multinational consumer goods company alone has over 300,000 current pieces of artwork, which require up to 60,000 minor changes per year. Label and artwork professionals already have a time and labour-intensive job with a single artwork taking up to one hour to change manually. They need a software solution that will relieve cognitive overload to make mental space for higher level operations such as design optimisation and branding.

There are three essentials to high-quality UI and UX in label and artwork management software that allow professionals to flourish at their jobs without the burden of dealing with process changes and incurring possible errors.

1. Designed by manufacturing professionals for manufacturing professionals

Often those who design industrial software are doing so from a desk in an office, completely separate from the actual environment where the application will be used. This can immediately limit the usability of the software. The environments where industrial software is used, whether it is a plant floor, a print room, or a warehouse, can be challenging or even hazardous. So attention to the UI and cognitive load is paramount. A software UI that takes up a large amount of cognitive load is not practical to use in such high-intensity environments, therefore, in the case of label and artwork, a UI design that allows label and artwork professionals to seamlessly work within different industrial spaces is essential.

The UI for the Kallik label and artwork management (LAM) solution was developed through close collaboration with existing customers who are key industry players. It was then rigorously tested in real manufacturing scenarios to allow the creation of a label and artwork management solution that is perfectly adapted to the environments label and artwork professionals work in. This level of understanding of label and artwork management processes can only be achieved through the close collaboration and expertise of relevant industry players.

2. Intuitive use by design

An intuitive design helps industrial professionals do their job not just efficiently, but more accurately, reducing errors and decreasing unexpected costs and delays. Our software application, for example, leverages symbols and UI features common in personal applications to enhance the usability of the application. This creates the ultimate software application UX that reduces the need for extensive prior training as its systems for use reflect those of popular personal applications – allowing quick adoption of new software.

The software application interface also enables the mobility for plant operators to move between sites with ease while inspecting operations and allows designers and managers to access the software database on the move, from different work devices. Industry professionals need solutions that are designed with the end-user in mind and with the deep domain knowledge of manufacturing systems and operations to develop a UI that truly optimises critical manufacturing processes.

3. Streamlines complex functions into one manageable system

Industrial software solutions should make the lives of label and artwork professionals easier. That means they should be designed to simplify processes and streamline different functions into one, easy to navigate system. Quality UX design will collect all the tools and functionalities needed to complete tasks in one place for easy access and maximum efficiency. One UI, one view of all the processes involved.

The software design should also allow new integrations and capabilities to be added with ease over time to continuously improve UX and keep up with changes to the industrial environment. When we designed our label and artwork management software application, we made sure we would be able to seamlessly integrate more advanced user-facing features going forward, that can quickly become available to users. This could include the potential to build more mobile-enabled functionality into the software application in the future, such as graphical packages, 3D rendering technology or augmented reality views of labelling and artwork on the factory floor. Automatic updates allow for label and artwork professionals to receive consistently high standards of UX even as the industry changes.

The future of Label and Artwork Management software is UX optimised

UX optimised label and artwork management (LAM) software is the next step to optimising manufacturing processes. It is an investment worth making. For every dollar a company invests in improved UX, that dollar returns $100 in revenue. High-quality UX improves productivity for everyone involved in the labelling and artwork process, from designers and label creators to reviewers and auditors, and operations teams, all the way up to upper-level management.

Ensuring LAM software applications have a good UX benefits the entire value chain. The optimised operations boost speed to market and customer satisfaction, both crucial parts in an ever-changing industrial landscape that demands time critical, accurate, and value-added service and delivery.

The European cosmetics market is extensive, reaching an annual consumption value of over €76 billion. With many of the largest conglomerates owning dozens of brands, each with their own extensive product ranges catering to different market segments, there is a complex web that must be carefully managed and regulated. Beth Peckover, VP Operations at Kallik, discusses the complex regulatory landscape for cosmetics firms and argues potential upcoming changes in the European market should spark a rush for greater digital management.

The cosmetics industry is a highly competitive, complex space to do business in – from formulation and testing through to design and go-to-market strategies. Yet many cosmetics firms still struggle with injecting agility, visibility and end-to-end management into critical areas of their business. These areas may function day-to-day without major issue, but introduce any unexpected change and it can bring the entire business value chain to a halt.

No more so than through the simple label. Picture a typical cosmetics product, such as a skin-care cream. The product is covered in labels, logos and regulatory symbols, then packaged in a box covered in similar assets and branding. For many products, they may also include an enclosed supplementary leaflet. The individual assets and phrases used in this will likely number in the dozens – each carefully designed, reviewed and approved. It’s easy to see from this that any amends or updates will have a significant ripple effect, which will be multiplied across each individual affected product line.

The winds of change have reached the cosmetics market

Since the EU Cosmetics Regulation came into force in 2009 – replacing the older Cosmetics Directive – cosmetics firms looking to sell their products into the EU markets have faced a consistent set of rules to comply with.

We’ve recently seen the EU overhaul legislation in other industries traditionally considered ‘highly regulated’, with medical devices the latest to be affected by tighter requirements, and an ongoing consultation on chemical labelling and packing. The cosmetics industry looks set to be next in line – and firms must prepare for the change and disruption this will entail.

With an ongoing public consultation on revising the Cosmetics Regulation to better align with EU sustainability goals, a shake-up – and most likely tightening – of the rules and requirements surrounding cosmetics products is imminent. Critical assets such as labels and artwork are unlikely to be immune.

Tighten asset management and visibility before it’s too late

With this in mind, major cosmetics companies with global product lines numbering in the hundreds or even thousands could face a significant challenge to identify, update and re-issue all affected assets to achieve compliance with any new or amended regulations.

These potential changes are solely for a single region – the EU. Other lucrative markets such as China and the U.S. will have their own regulatory regimes for products to comply with. It is clear a new approach to manage cosmetic product assets on a large scale is required to better handle these challenges.

There are three key ways cosmetics companies can embrace digital asset management to tighten regulatory compliance and at the same time enhance operations:

1. Knock down data siloes and build a single source of truth

A natural first step for any compliance project is to identify any cosmetics products affected by upcoming reforms before actioning the required changes. This is easier said than done, and often uncovers siloed assets, separate translations or region and nation-specific product lines that fall outside of the oversight of a central corporate team. Acquisitions of smaller companies can also introduce similar complexity, throwing new and unexpected product lines, outdated assets or new-language content into the mix.

Combine these issues, and the cost, complexity and timeframe of a compliance project can quickly threaten to spiral out of control.

Enter digital, centralised label and artwork management solutions. With a cloud-based platform that can be accessed by any team from any location, capable of managing all global and local assets within a ‘single source of truth’, cosmetics firms can better understand the scale of the task that lies ahead and avoid any unpleasant revelations further down the line.

2. Ditch the manual processes – this is just too complex to manage at scale

Consider a product range of 100 different cosmetics – each sold into the EU and requiring product packaging and labelling in each of the bloc’s 24 different languages. Each language or product type introduced adds another layer of complexity and scale to the task at hand. Multiple translations, requested and managed by different teams worldwide, can also rapidly increase the risk of duplication.

Add to this the departmental disconnects experienced by many large companies, especially those operating in numerous countries and regions worldwide, and it becomes increasingly clear that label, artwork and packaging assets cannot be easily tracked, managed and amended across every product line without investing significant time, capacity and money.

By introducing advanced technologies such as automation, companies can reduce the manual burden of identifying each individual affected asset, making the necessary changes in-house and running through the review, approval and reissuing process. By adding this digital helping hand, firms can also reduce the risk of human error being introduced – such as misplaced logos being printed on a product label, or outdated phrases used on packaging.

3. Time for a digital facelift for label and artwork management

As digital transformation efforts accelerate across the board, driven by factors from pandemic disruption to new business models and rising customer expectations, cosmetics firms simply cannot afford to stand still and continue with legacy processes and systems. Yet a new breed of advanced label and artwork management systems has arrived to help tackle many of these digital pain-points felt by the industry.

Kallik has extensive experience in helping firms operating in highly-regulated industries overcome their compliance challenges, ranging from chemicals to medical devices. Leading global cosmetics seller Mary Kay, for example, uses the Kallik Veraciti™ platform and capabilities such as “Where Used” functionality to better track and manage global assets affected by industry changes or evolving business requirements.

By moving away from legacy methods of asset management, firms can better get to grips with the global picture of their product lines and operations, unlocking the agility and resilience needed to respond to business disruptions such as regulatory change.

The price of inactivity is high – act now…

The challenges brought by non-compliant cosmetics operations are not simple a ‘cost of doing business’ – they can be wide-ranging and cause significant damage. This could range from product recalls and regulator investigations, freezes on selling products into certain markets and even long-term damage to brand confidence.

…and reap the benefits across the value chain

The benefits of digitisation don’t stop at compliance. They extend throughout cosmetics firm operations, adding greater accuracy, consistency and agility – such as the ability to rapidly update large numbers of labels with new product ingredients – to every step of the business value chain.

By acting now, cosmetics firms can establish truly end-to-end digital operations for managing all global assets in a single, secure cloud-based repository.

The Nordic region is a potentially lucrative area for medical device companies to expand into, with analyst research estimating Sweden alone to have a 2.7% market share of the €140bn European medical device market. But practical challenges, in particular operational obstacles on the regulatory side, have deterred many manufacturers from making the leap into this geography. Bob Tiling, VP Global Sales at Kallik, explains how effectively managing the simple device label could be key to overcoming the challenges of entering the Nordic market.

Expansion into one or even several Nordic countries may seem like a minor leap to today’s large, multinational medical device manufacturers – but business leaders with an eye on new market growth should beware the pitfalls. These range from special logistics labels on products for each healthcare association through to large-scale downstream compliance challenges. Dedicated label and artwork management software solutions have made significant strides in bringing advanced digital capabilities to bear on many of these challenges – and could yet again bring peace of mind to those exploring a push into the Nordic medical device market.

Here are my three major considerations that medical device manufacturers should focus on when weighing up expansion into the Nordics – and how technology can help solve them:

High risk, high reward? Weigh the costs vs. benefits to your business

At first glance, expansion into the Nordic market may seem like a case of ‘high effort, low reward’ for many medical device companies. The entire Nordic medical device market, for example, is smaller than the German market alone, and the Nordic market is far from the largest by value, given the relatively small populations of each nation within the region.

Yet medical device margins are significantly higher in the region when compared to most European nations and indeed to countries beyond. Nordic countries have a very high standard of living and per capita wealth is equally strong, with effective healthcare systems and high-quality products used in treatment. Healthcare spending is also typically very high as a percentage of GDP.

Expanding into or setting up in the Nordic market ultimately represents a calculated risk for many medical device companies – do they replicate compliance tasks and increase the volume of labels and assets managed internally to sell into this market, or do they cut their losses and focus on large, more lucrative targets such as Germany and the UK?

If manufacturers conduct suitable research and can identify a strong appetite or market niche in the Nordics to position proven, fully compliant medical device ranges, there is a potentially rewarding opportunity. The short-term risk, therefore, may be comfortably worth the long-term reward – but only if manufacturers have suitable systems in place to comfortably handle country-specific labelling and artwork requirements that can be customised to effectively handle national nuances.

National nuances mean labelling is a nightmare – a wake-up call for digital management

One of the main challenges facing medical device companies looking to ‘crack’ the Nordic market is the scale of it. Spanning Denmark, Norway and Sweden, Finland and Iceland, the market is fraught with differing product preferences, healthcare system priorities and customer expectations. Each national healthcare authority is also far smaller than other European counterparts such as the NHS, and each has differing back-end processes such as those covering general management, documentation and reimbursement. Beyond this, Nordic regulation and labelling requirements also closely follow the same path as the majority of Europe – following EU directives as a core regulatory framework. This today includes the recently introduced MDR and IVDR, and formerly MDD.

As a result, medical devices sold to and used in these Nordic countries require extra labels and markings on product packaging. Some manufacturers, still conscious of their often- disruptive compliance efforts to satisfy MDR and IVDR deadlines, have opted to avoid the market for fear of replicating similar compliance burdens several times over. Again, by looking to digital alternatives to the more ‘traditional’ legacy methods of manual spreadsheets and disparate systems, this is far easier to get to grips with on a single easily managed platform.

M&A ambitions just add to the problems with onboarding challenges

Can you buy your way in? Can medical device companies looking to expand in the Nordic market instead aim to achieve this relatively pain-free through merger or acquisition? The answer is not so simple.

Manufacturers that take over existing Nordic medical device companies could face a burden similar to the scale of MDR or IVDR compliance projects – something we at Kallik have seen pose a major challenge to day-to-day operations of medical device companies of all sizes.

Significant increases in the number of assets that must be amended for rebranding product lines, newly discovered siloes of information and a scattered workforce could all threaten to make a typical acquisition into an unexpected time- and resource-consuming challenge. Add the usual M&A challenges of translating assets into multiple languages for the region, and without the right digital backbone this quickly becomes a non-starter.

Focus on digital maturity now to avoid new market ‘growing pains’

It is clear that expanding existing medical device operations into the Nordic market is far easier said than done, with downstream compliance challenges, asset management and multiple languages all obstacles to be overcome. Embracing end-to-end label and artwork management within a single digital system offers a lifeline to medical device manufacturers. It helps ease the onboarding burden by allowing companies to establish pre-set templates and layouts suitable for products being sold into each Nordic country, and bulk update existing assets for acquired product lines.

Most problems stem simply from an enforced need to manually create, update and manage labels and other product assets – a lesson industry as a whole learned during the MDR and IVDR compliance rush.

Digital alternatives offer far more than a ‘luxury’ alternative to this – they are increasingly the norm for manufacturers to weather the storm of emerging regulations, customer expectations around product traceability, and other unexpected industry disruption. Those that can deploy and maintain a truly mature digital environment for label and artwork management will be laying the groundwork to flourish in potentially lucrative markets such as the Nordics.

A recent survey of manufacturing leaders found up to 90% of manufacturers struggle with integration challenges, so when disruption happens, they are unable to cope quickly or effectively – causing a ripple effect right through the supply chain. As businesses of all sizes continue to ramp up their digital transformation efforts, end-to-end digital integration must be at the heart of these projects – and that, argues Arjun Khanna, Chief Technology & Innovation Officer at Kallik, means right down to the artwork and label processes that are essential to the smooth flow of the supply chain. He discusses the extensive operational challenges faced by businesses using disparate systems and siloed data, and how many of these issues can be overcome with careful integration of core solutions.

Avoid the disconnect

Siloed operations keep businesses vulnerable to disruption. Acquired a small competitor in a different region? New regulation enacted that requires changes to existing product labelling? Rolling out a new factory process at the very end of the value chain? Any of these could require a significant response to avoid major disruption. Disparate, disconnected systems leave businesses poorly placed to respond to deal with any disruption or shake-up in typical day-to-day operations. 

Legacy systems – very little control, disparate data

Despite such threats to business continuity, many firms continue to operate a patchwork of core systems with either little to no integration with each other. They are often developed piecemeal with in-house fixes or manual workarounds. While this may help maintain the status quo of day-to-day operations, it is highly vulnerable to disruption and far from agile compared to more digitally mature competitors. Thankfully, the latest wave of digital transformation has placed an increased focus on cloud-based solutions and customisable implementations for core platforms such as ERP systems. However, other, more legacy systems or manual processes are equally critical to operational success – yet often neglected in the grand scheme of ‘digital transformation’ projects. This lack of integration is especially noticeable among businesses operating in highly-regulated industries such as pharma, medical devices or chemicals, despite these being prime candidates for short-notice impactful disruption. 

Artwork, labelling and packaging must not be an integration ‘blind spot’

The disconnect is particularly noticeable in siloed product assets, such as labels, artwork and symbols. This essential part of the business process often is subject to minimal version control or global insight, and where integration with print requests and data flows from the ERP system, for example, are yet to be embraced on a significant scale. But these label and artwork management systems play an increasingly critical role in ensuring product consistency, consumer safety and regulatory compliance. As a result, having these operations and assets siloed is becoming non-negotiable. Integration with other platforms such as regulatory systems is a must. 

The knock-on effects could be catastrophic 

Take a label for a simple medical device intended for the EU market. This must pass through extensive review and approval processes to ensure medical, marketing and regulatory information – including various symbols and markings – are all present, correct and consistent. To be sold broadly throughout the EU, this device label would in theory need be translated into 24 different languages. This upstream process is therefore very delicate and susceptible to disruption or human error. If an incorrect version of a regulatory symbol is used, or some medical information is changed in one language then not updated across all other language versions, this could introduce a major error – potentially even threatening the health of the end-user and triggering a costly product recall.
If the systems involved in this workflow are not fully integrated into other critical businesses systems, processes and databases, the risk of recalls can rise significantly. 

Find a complementary digital artwork and labelling system 

Consolidation and integration is key when it comes to rationalising and standardising systems and processes as part of a company’s digital maturity project. That means finding proven, feature-rich solutions that can be deployed across all necessary department and locations worldwide, with full integration capability to ensure seamless operation with other core systems. Label and artwork management platforms are no exception. Indeed, these must be able to integrate with other critical software as standard – from Regulatory Information Management (RIM) systems, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) platforms and Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solutions. 

Integration in the cloud

Business leaders would also be well-advised to opt for a cloud-based solution that can be readily deployed and accessed in any location by any department, adding a new level of scalability. As businesses connect and integrate critical IT infrastructure, the benefits of truly unified operations and visibility become apparent. For example, if a specific product asset or symbol must be replaced or updated at short notice, users can tap into the ‘Where Used’ functionality within a fully integrated management solution to identify every instance of the existing asset actively being used worldwide – and effortlessly make a bulk update in turn. No manual searching of data siloes, no piecemeal updates across multiple teams – this is all easily accessible and actionable in a ‘single source of truth’.

The benefits of end-to-end integration are all in one

This unlocks powerful end-to-end audit and version control capabilities – allowing any users with relevant permissions to make changes and flag comments in a clear, actionable format. By integrating a solution with further powerful features, such as automated artwork generation, businesses can significantly reduce the risk of human error in asset creation, updating and positioning. For artwork and label management solutions, a cloud-based end-to-end platform such as Veraciti™ from Kallik is an ideal candidate focus for any integration-minded business – providing a standard set of APIs out the box as a tried-and-tested ‘blueprint’ to follow during implementation. From a security perspective, shifting to a single artwork and label management platform also brings fresh benefits – with a single sign-on and corporate login enhancing system security, user management and data protection.

Keep pace with more agile, digitally-mature competitors

As the digital transformation race continues to heat up, now is an ideal time to take stock of your legacy IT stack and ensure software can either be heavily integrated or replace with a modern, fit-for-purpose alternative. Embracing this integration approach can help reduce artwork and labelling errors, ensure end-user safety and compliance in highly-regulated industries, and provide the agility needed for businesses to quickly go-to-market – whether in a new geography or with a new product.