Huber+Suhner, a global manufacturer with multiple production sites, aimed to unify machine connectivity, streamline data exchange, and enhance digital manufacturing processes. With an existing heterogeneous machine park and a variety of legacy systems, they needed a platform that could handle multiple protocols, scale across sites, and enable rapid deployment of industrial data use cases. When existing IoT initiatives fell short, the company turned to Crosser while exploring alternative platforms for industrial connectivity.

We needed a platform to connect machines and exchange information efficiently. We had several tools in place before, but none of them satisfied our strategy or requirements,” saysFlavio Eisenring, Data Engineer at Huber+Suhner.

Project Background

The project began with a legacy machine interface that couldn’t connect to existing systems. What started as a single use case quickly grew into a broader initiative to consolidate machine data, enable analytics, and improve process efficiency.

A cross-functional team of nearly ten IT and business stakeholders collected requirements and evaluated several platforms over three to four months. The selection process considered factors such as low-code capability, cost, and supplier collaboration.

“Coming from a previous solution where we faced significant challenges with reliability and support, our evaluation focused on finding a truly robust, future-proof platform backed by a genuine partnership. Crosser impressed us on all fronts. Their platform offers the perfect balance of a graphical development interface - which simplifies onboarding for new team members—and the flexibility for our experts to implement custom code for complex challenges. This technical excellence, combined with their outstanding, direct support and a clear understanding of our core problems during the evaluation, made them the obvious choice.“ says Michael Müssle, IT Teamlead Infrastructure & Cloud at Huber+Suhner.

Among several solution providers evaluated, Crosser stood out for its expertise, hands-on workshops, and clear, structured approach to factory floor integration.

"During a four-day workshop at their office, we reviewed several use cases in detail and demonstrated how Crosser could address each one. It was a great opportunity to show the flexibility of the platform and establish a collaborative approach from the very beginning." says David Nienhaus, Sr. Solution Engineer at Crosser.

“At first, it was about collecting analytics data and storing it on the cloud. Now, we use Crosser for far more than just analytics, most importantly for MES integration and recipe management. What I really appreciate is how quickly and conveniently we can solve challenges. Crosser enables us to start working on use cases without spending weeks getting familiar with the system,” explains Flavio.

The platform allows the team to implement bi-directional MES connectivity using OPC protocols for machines and REST-APIs for MES systems. In addition, Crosser supports direct database connections for recipe management and Azure connectors to publish data to the cloud for analytics.

Expanding use cases from first flows to multi-site adoption

Initially, around five users started using Crosser, including three main data engineers, with adoption expanding to other sites in Switzerland and Poland, integrating existing OPC connections and enabling MES integration.

Already in the start of the transformation project, the management team identified a need of simplifying the connectivity and development of asset integrations. Focusing on creating business values, instead of spending unnecessary time and resources on integration and communication with industrial protocols, they looked for a solution with readily available connectors and data transformation modules.

The logical choice by then was NodeRED, an open source platform selected to connect data between production lines and the Warehouse Management System (WMS) using Low-code and pre-built connectors and analytics modules. The primary objective was to enhance the efficiency of the production and palletizing processes. However, as the team implemented various use cases, it became evident that NodeRED was not performing as desired.

The performance and reliability of the NodeRED OPC-connectors emerged as stumbling blocks, directly impacting the company's production capabilities.

This situation led them to search for a more reliable and flexible solution with someone that could provide support when needed. That was when Alexander Jung , the Head of IT, approached Crosser to replace NodeRED. 

“The Node-Red setup was not stable, causing issues and losing information. For this project, we've moved from daily process downtimes to achieving nearly zero downtimes with the implementation of Crosser” says Alexander Jung , the Head of IT at Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH

According to Mr Jung, “Simplicity was a strategic requirement, and the reason why we decided to start working with Crosser. We needed a solution we could trust—something reliable, flexible, and easy to use. Crosser not only simplified our processes but also ensured that our development is more reliable."

Transition from NodeRED to Crosser

The team was already familiar with the concept, and could easily adapt to the Crosser method of implementing intelligent data integration flows on the factory floor.

“The rich library of connectors and analytics modules made it very simple to connect, transform and integrate to designated systems. Even protocols like Modbus that we didn’t have any previous experience of…” says Alexander Jung , the Head of IT at Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH

Value and Outcomes with Crosser

The results speak for themselves - Crosser provided Blechwarenfabrik Limburg with a more reliable system compared to NodeRED. The time required and maintenance cost associated decreased significantly with Crosser’s centralized platform, offering easier versioning, management, and orchestration. The reusability and scalability of Crosser’s FlowApp templates allowed the replication of use cases across different production lines.

“Their learning curve was very short, due to their experience with NodeRED. The only new experiences were the deployment of the Crosser Node (runtime) and designated flows. Which they learned to appreciate very quickly” says David Nienhaus, Senior Solutions Engineer at Crosser.

The Way Forward

Encouraged by their achievements, Blechwarenfabrik Limburg plans to implement more use cases with Crosser. The next use cases in the roadmap involve:

• Power consumption for compressors, (compressed air) - see the relation between power consumption related to the production. Needed for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles.
• Predictive Maintenance; prevent wheel issues by monitoring and analyzing vibrations and other anomalies for Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV).
• Monitor and analyze the production lines for anomalies.

“Working so closely with the Crosser team, we quickly understood that they had experience within many industrial use cases, like energy monitoring and data automation for example. Which aligns with our road map for those areas. ” says  Christoph Weber, CTO at Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH

Summary

The collaboration between Blechwarenfabrik Limburg and Crosser, stands as a great example of how strategic initiative can be simplified with a proven Low-code solution.

Showcasing that the transition from a pilot platform into a more reliable solution can be both agile and cost effective. Due to the fact that Crosser fits any architecture, and can adapt to almost any integration use case - in parallel to the systems already in place.

About Blechwarenfabrik

Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH is one of the leading producer for chemical-technical packaging with over 140 years of tradition.

The company is with more than 500 employees one of the biggest industrial employers in the region of Limburg and offers lots of challenging jobs and trainings in different fields.

The meaning of tradition is for us the solidarity with Limburg following the mind of our founder Joseph Heppel. Big investments in modernization and environmental protection in our headquarter in Limburg showing that we are and will be a reliable partner in the region.

The meaning of innovation is for us to follow market requirements and to safeguard the business of Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH with new products and international cooperation. Continuing that business policy Blechwarenfabrik Limburg GmbH managed it despite all commercial crises to be a dependable and healthy partner for customers and suppliers and to be a safe employer at any time.

https://www.blechwaren-limburg.de/en/

About Crosser

Crosser designs and develops a hybrid-first Streaming Analytics & Integration software for any Cloud, On-premise or Edge. The Crosser Platform enables real-time processing of streaming, event-driven or batch data for Intelligent Pipelines & Automations and for Industrial IoT data flows. All managed from a single Control Center and powered by a low-code and low-effort experience.

The solution is built to fight complexity with simplicity through the Crosser Flow Studio, the visual design tool that enables teams to innovate faster than ever without developers. The software is ideally suited for Enterprise customers of various industries and applications, including Edge Analytics, Industrial Connectivity,  Industry 4.0, Streaming Analytics, Hybrid Integration and Intelligent Workflows.

www.crosser.io