They just celebrated their first company anniversary: the three TU Eindhoven master's students who founded the company Stactics in 2020. For their accommodation, they chose Twice's new Alpha hub on the TU/e Campus in Eindhoven. In this inspiring startup environment, young high-tech entrepreneurs can rent business space at low cost. And learn a lot from each other in the meantime.
From the fields of Technical Business Administration and Data Science, Lars van der Werf, Lucas Peeters and Jasper Ebus combine their knowledge to help companies, through the latest techniques and insights, put their data to good use. "Most companies are now aware that they have to 'do something with data' if they want to continue to exist in the future," says Lars. "But they often have no idea how to handle data or how much data is already being collected unnoticed within their company. We always try to bridge the gap between what data science can do today and what a company needs. We are not going to push technology into a company, but we first look at where the real problems lie. Is the quality of a product perhaps structurally too low or is a lead time too long? Then we look at how we can solve that with data science. Only then do you make real efficiency gains and concrete results are achieved such as time and cost reductions."
Data deployment for solving production problems
As an example, Lars mentions a Stactics project at a customer who manufactures machinery. If an error occurred while testing the machines, the entire testing process had to be restarted. This could add up to four days. "There are steps in such a process where people don't always see the errors," Lars explains. "Moreover, a lot of data was collected by sensors on the machines, with which nothing was done. By properly analyzing and processing this data, it was possible to see early on in the testing process that something was going wrong. Then the process was immediately stopped, adjusted and testing could continue again, without restarting the whole process from the beginning. In this way, we were able to take significant steps to drastically reduce the turnaround time of these tests. With increased production and cost reduction as a result."
Ignorance
Stactics focuses primarily on companies in the manufacturing and production industry, where there is often still great room for improvement in process optimization. "Companies sometimes don't even realize how much data they have already collected," Lars says. "For example, in Exel sheets or in a clock hour system that keeps track of how many hours are worked on a product. And if that is not the case, then we will look at how we can get the desired data to the surface quickly."
The simple, but oh-so-smart Kelvin
To illustrate how simple it can be to be smart about data, they at Stactics came up with a technique that they applied to a simple home thermometer. The device, called Kelvin, collects all kinds of data about the indoor climate of a room. Lars: "That way, you can create a data-rich environment out of any room in no time. For example, if Kelvin sends a signal that the CO2 level is getting too high, then you know you have to open a window. Because research shows that above a certain level, people are significantly less productive. We always use this example to illustrate to companies how you can achieve efficient results quickly and easily by combining very simple data sources."
'Twice helps us grow'
The young entrepreneurs at Stactics are delighted with their collaboration with Twice. "The step from university to entrepreneurship is a big one," Lars said. "Twice helps young entrepreneurs in many areas: from pitch competitions to building a network, from determining your market segment to help with everything around starting a business. There is a fun, dynamic atmosphere in the Alpha hub with all young high-tech companies together. We share experiences and learn from each other. Yes, Twice really helps us bring our company to greater maturity and further growth."
