Kilews: Leading the World in Sensor Screwdrivers to Actively Seize the Industry 4.0 Opportunities

Taiwan's hand tool manufacturing industry ranked first in the world in terms of export value for 5 consecutive years from 1998 to 2002. In 2019, the export value reached as much as 3.7 billion USD. According to the international institution, MarketsandMarkets, the global electric tool market is estimated to grow from 31.8 billion USD in 2019 to 41.7 billion USD by 2024; a compound annual growth rate of 5.5%. Moreover, the market will benefit from increasing demand due to the growing infrastructure in emerging economies and the demand for electric tools in the manufacturing industry as a whole.

Walter Ye, the CEO of TAITRA, said that, “Technology highly influences market application. The combination of the two major technologies, IoT and AI, is expected to significantly contribute to huge amounts of intelligent applications and change a variety of industries gradually”. Having been regarded as a traditional industry for a long time, the hand tool industry has recently combined new digital technologies with pre-existing industry techniques because of the impact of Industry 4.0. By developing innovative new products, the industry is striving to overcome its price competition dilemma and redefine its economic reality.

Taiwan Excellence encourages all companies in Taiwan to embrace the value of innovation and organizes the “Taiwan Excellence Awards” annually to honor the companies which exhibit robust strength and creativity. In the hand tool industry, Kilews transformed the established form of the screwdriver by introducing a server sensor and integrating a software control system to transmit data and the quality records of the lock screws on the production line on a real-time basis, thereby greatly improve production efficiency in the manufacturing industry. The R&D passion of Kilews has been recognized by the “Taiwan Excellence Awards” for 3 consecutive years since 2018. Their latest award-winning products include the “High Precision Transducerized Tool” and the “Intelligent Industrial Brushless Cordless Tool”.

Wang, De-Fan, the general manager of Kilews Industrial Co. Ltd., once stated, “The electric tool can be easily coordinated with computers, providing the advantages of internet transmission, big data management, and IoT connection, which is expected to replace pneumatic tools”. Nowadays, due to the effects of US-China trade frictions, the relocation of the global manufacturing industry expedites the decentralization process of production bases. The wide use of sensor-equipped tools in production lines can be used to transmit the assembly data from various overseas subsidiaries and production departments on a real-time basis, enabling company headquarters to immediately respond to issues and conduct intelligent control effectively and quickly. Therefore, the advantages of remote application in the Industry 4.0 IoT can be exploited to their fullest.

With the assistance of the "Taiwan Industry Image Enhancement Project (IEP)", promoted by the Bureau of Foreign Trade, MOEA, Kilews successfully joined the Taiwan Excellence Pavilion at Thailand’s Industrial Manufacturing Exhibition in 2019 to jointly seek out ASEAN business opportunities. To solve the issue of insufficient after-sales maintenance in the overseas market, which has been a common problem in Taiwan’s manufacturing industry, Kilews has established more than 20 service bases around the world to uphold their stated business goal of “Immediate Supply, Instant Service.” This enables Kilews to master local assembly and marketing strategies, strengthen the support system for distributors, and integrate with the supply network. Today, lots of well-known manufacturing companies, including Foxconn, Philips, LG, and Panasonic are all important clients of Kilews.

Taiwan Excellence will continue to promote our groundbreaking products through our official social media communities and professional network platforms such as LinkedIn and Facebook to enhance Taiwan’s reliable, high-quality, and top craftsmanship image in producing hardware hand tools and fasteners for the international market. This will further help the industry develop and find untapped markets in the new age of digitization.